Speaker 1: Good Day, Welcome to you Ain't Seen Nothing Yet the
Speaker 1: movie podcast, where I chat to a movie lover about
Speaker 1: a classic or beloved movie they haven't quite got around
Speaker 1: to watching until now. And today's guest on our fiftieth
Speaker 1: episode is my mate broadcaster Wally Laly.
Speaker 2: Do you any think you have a chance against us?
Speaker 2: Said mister Cowboy.
Speaker 3: Too, Infinity and beyond wax on, right hand, wax off,
Speaker 3: left hand, wax on, wax off, haven't.
Speaker 4: A right don't see nothing here?
Speaker 1: It's Gold LOGI winner Walkley winner Whalid r Lee returns
Speaker 1: that you ain't seen nothing yet. Now, if you're in Australia,
Speaker 1: you probably well you definitely know who Walid Ali is.
Speaker 1: He's one of the most important voices in our media landscape.
Speaker 1: You know him from the Project Offside as his podcast
Speaker 1: The Minefield, also his columns for Fairfax newspapers around the country.
Speaker 1: He is one of the most thoughtful, considered person people
Speaker 1: I've met. He's also what this one of the well,
Speaker 1: one of the smartest people I know without a doubt.
Speaker 1: When it be last time and you Ain't Seen Nothing yet?
Speaker 1: To discuss Star Wars, he nominated his three favorite films
Speaker 1: as the Dark Knight, Back to the Future, and The
Speaker 1: Princess Bride. I'm looking forward to see what his next
Speaker 1: three favorite films are as he returns to you ain't
Speaker 1: seen nothing yet. I'm bloody stoked they have my mate
Speaker 1: Walid Ali once again joining me today.
Speaker 5: Hey there, my name is Willie Ali, and my next
Speaker 5: three favorite films are The Godfather Part two, My offer
Speaker 5: is dead Nothing, the Castle.
Speaker 2: It's called a home, your dickhead.
Speaker 5: And Malcolm X.
Speaker 6: We are a Nichan, the tribe of Shabbas lost in
Speaker 6: this wilderingness called North America.
Speaker 5: But up until now I had never seen the Empire
Speaker 5: strikes back.
Speaker 1: Yes, the celebrations haven't lasted long for Luke Skywalker and
Speaker 1: the rebellion as Darth Vader's Empire wastes no time in
Speaker 1: striking back. Yes, the title makes sense almost immediately in
Speaker 1: the follow up to the biggest movie of all time,
Speaker 1: which they do by producing arguably the greatest sequel of
Speaker 1: our time, Godfather Part two.
Speaker 2: Has it pipped in my opinion, We can discuss that
Speaker 2: very soon.
Speaker 1: My leap owhen Kershner, George Lucas's old film school teacher,
Speaker 1: takes over the reins and produces a darker installment with
Speaker 1: perhaps the biggest twist in movie history. As a real
Speaker 1: gut kicker to Luke Skywalker and to us the audience,
Speaker 1: the whole gang is here as well as a curious
Speaker 1: little green guy who will endear himself to movie audiences
Speaker 1: for years to come.
Speaker 2: Ali Walid, Yoda, did you enjoy?
Speaker 5: I'd like I like that. Enjoy that I did? I
Speaker 5: did like Yoda? Do you know what caught me last time?
Speaker 2: I listened back to our last episode when you what
Speaker 2: Star Wars on.
Speaker 5: The first so I forgotten all this and you were.
Speaker 2: Expecting you were like, where's Yoda? Yes, Yoda?
Speaker 5: Where is Yoda?
Speaker 2: I know?
Speaker 5: And then he appears. Can I say something about the
Speaker 5: appearance of Yoda? Yes, I was not expecting that when
Speaker 5: he first appeared he would be this sort of weird
Speaker 5: mix of Fuzzy Bear and Gonzo and Kermit the Frock.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but he's a bit bumbling and a bit selfish
Speaker 5: and just almost a bit desperate, like give me that
Speaker 5: food and whatever. It's comical, yes, but it's like, oh
Speaker 5: well this, I was like, what happened to Yoda? And
Speaker 5: then when he says, oh you want Master Yoda? I
Speaker 5: go ah, okay, So this is like a species and
Speaker 5: he's just another one of these species who happens to
Speaker 5: look like Yoda because he's the same species. And now
Speaker 5: we'll go meet Yoda. And then suddenly Yoda clicks into
Speaker 5: gear and I still I mean, I've only just watched this,
Speaker 5: so this is completely fresh. I haven't done any reading.
Speaker 5: I've barely had time to think about it. But I'm
Speaker 5: trying to figure out what exactly happened there. Was he
Speaker 5: putting on this persona as a way of creating some
Speaker 5: kind of filter so that Skywalker had to prove himself
Speaker 5: worthy of being instructed. But then if that's the case,
Speaker 5: that seems weird because he still didn't seem to think
Speaker 5: that Skywalker was worthy of being instructed, and so Obi
Speaker 5: Wan Kenobi had to vouch for him again, in which case,
Speaker 5: what was the point of that filter in the first place.
Speaker 2: I assume iver seinmed it was a facade.
Speaker 1: And because you know, you suspect that Yoda, nothing happens
Speaker 1: by a chance.
Speaker 2: No controls everything probably looks to arrive.
Speaker 1: Yes, so he's being playful. It's a little test of
Speaker 1: ken Skywalker handle this. You know he's going to bail
Speaker 1: or the very first opportunity he can't find Yoda or
Speaker 1: this is who he's dealing with. But I do find
Speaker 1: the transformation from bumbling into I'm the guy. Yeah happens,
Speaker 1: and I'm there for it, like I completely believe it.
Speaker 5: But it's instant.
Speaker 7: Yes.
Speaker 5: So so this led me to the other thing theory
Speaker 5: that I was wondering about is does something come over him?
Speaker 5: Is Yoda actually a spirit rather than a body? And
Speaker 5: then at some point Yoda turns up in this body?
Speaker 2: Right, So what we're watching the beginning is the.
Speaker 5: Vessel, yes, and a different person, a different being, and
Speaker 5: then Yoda just sort of is downloaded and suddenly this
Speaker 5: new thing.
Speaker 1: We don't see bumbling Yoda again in the galaxy at all.
Speaker 5: It's such a I mean, that's a spoiler, but that
Speaker 5: is such It is such a weird thing, don't you
Speaker 5: think it is?
Speaker 2: And I haven't again.
Speaker 1: And what I loved about our last chat was you
Speaker 1: were able to bring some new perspectives the Star Wars.
Speaker 1: I suspect it was a way of introducing him to
Speaker 1: trick the audiences and thinking, okay, well exactly, like the
Speaker 1: trick works definitely, you know, because you're like, who is
Speaker 1: this guy this is not the guy that this master Yoda,
Speaker 1: that we're the Jedi trainer. Surely he's not the teacher
Speaker 1: for Luke Skywalker. And then yeah, the way it actually,
Speaker 1: I think reveals itself to me. The mastery of frank
Speaker 1: Oz to make this seem so real is phenomenal. George
Speaker 1: Lucas tried and campaigned to get frank Oz nominated for
Speaker 1: an Oscar.
Speaker 8: Really.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So there's been more recent debate about CGI and characters
Speaker 1: and how they can e motion capture kind of characters.
Speaker 1: Should they be nominated, you know, But I'm sure the
Speaker 1: time will come.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure if one has been.
Speaker 1: I might be wrong, but in nineteen eighty for a
Speaker 1: puppeteer to be nominated was probably a bridge too far
Speaker 1: for the Academy. So I think we'll no doubt speak
Speaker 1: a lot more about Yoda and many more things about
Speaker 1: Empire Strikes Back.
Speaker 2: Obviously, before we leave it, they can ask you a question.
Speaker 5: Is there an official explanation for what I've observed here?
Speaker 2: Is there as why Yoda waseah?
Speaker 5: Is there a canonical version of this or is it
Speaker 5: just purely up to the speculation of the audience.
Speaker 1: The only explanation I've got is that obviously is very
Speaker 1: old and he's having a senior moment. Sure, okay, because
Speaker 1: he's like he's like I think in this, I think
Speaker 1: he's like five or for maybe four hundred years old
Speaker 1: in this.
Speaker 5: Well, no, he said he trained someone for eight hundred years.
Speaker 2: He's already older.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever it was.
Speaker 1: He's very old. He's very old, so he's allowed to
Speaker 1: have these moments.
Speaker 5: I get that. I don't know in his species how
Speaker 5: old old is maybe the average life span three thousand years.
Speaker 5: I don't know. Maybe he's just coming into adult.
Speaker 3: But what is there?
Speaker 5: There's the thing where C three pos got that it
Speaker 5: looks like a pen whatever it is, I can't remember now.
Speaker 5: It's like a laser type whatever, and he wants it,
Speaker 5: Yoda wants it back off him, and he's just kind
Speaker 5: of unable to get it. It's like mine, it's mine,
Speaker 5: and you can't. And I'm like, this is your guy.
Speaker 5: He just make it levitate and come to you like
Speaker 5: what's this and which, of course he then later does
Speaker 5: with the.
Speaker 2: Well, I guess he's but I think if he's still
Speaker 2: testing Luke to an.
Speaker 1: Agree that he's not going to use his powers in
Speaker 1: front of him to reveal himself.
Speaker 5: Yes, well he definitely buries them.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, he's a little bit of old guys in
Speaker 2: the Muppets.
Speaker 5: It's totally Muppets. Everything about it is the Muppets. He's
Speaker 5: a new Muppet.
Speaker 1: Yeah, apparently, frank Ers because there were a time when
Speaker 1: Mark Hamill had struggled a little bit, like you know,
Speaker 1: and this is this is all quite revolutionary. I mean
Speaker 1: when you get told that a new character you're going
Speaker 1: to be spending pivotal scenes with is going to be
Speaker 1: a puppet back in nineteen you know, he would have
Speaker 1: been told this in pre production so late seventies, like
Speaker 1: that's part of you, Okay, what house is going to work?
Speaker 1: And then being on set and not having the magic around,
Speaker 1: you're not being you know, like you know, obviously they
Speaker 1: would have done a little bit of green the green
Speaker 1: screen work in a New Hope, but this is a
Speaker 1: step above where it's like a puppet, and it's even
Speaker 1: though it's it's we've been we've had puppet experience with interview.
Speaker 2: We have your favorite interview ever was is still Elmo.
Speaker 1: But yeah, he struggled at times with it, and Frank
Speaker 1: Ez would bring along to entertain him Miss Piggy and
Speaker 1: with this, and eventually it's like, come up, let's get
Speaker 1: me Miss Piggy out and do a quick five minutes
Speaker 1: tight five for Mark Hamill.
Speaker 2: Just to keep his spirits up.
Speaker 1: But there's more to chat about Yoda and the training
Speaker 1: at the Daggabar system. But I want to go back
Speaker 1: to your next three films. Great films, Great films. The
Speaker 1: Castle has.
Speaker 2: Come up a lot.
Speaker 1: We interviewed Steve Curry when he spoke pretty extensively about
Speaker 1: his experiences on The Castle, which is great, but it's it's.
Speaker 2: Come up so many times. Sorry, no no.
Speaker 1: I love when there's a new film that comes up,
Speaker 1: but I equally love when there's repeat business.
Speaker 5: Can I the reason it happened? Full disclosure. I didn't
Speaker 5: know I'd have to choose three more this time, so
Speaker 5: I've had to cobble this together very quickly. But I
Speaker 5: also just watched The Castle for the first time on
Speaker 5: the weekend. No no, no, no, no no. I watched it when
Speaker 5: it came out. Weirdly, it came out ninety seven, which
Speaker 5: is the year I started law school, and I remember
Speaker 5: studying constitutional law in ninety eight so you can only
Speaker 5: imagine just how many Castle references there were in that class.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm going to go once that further and say
Speaker 1: the Castle was such a great influence on you, It
Speaker 1: drove you.
Speaker 5: Yes, there's no doubt, there's no without that. Who knows
Speaker 5: you are a great deal, I definitely do. It has
Speaker 5: to be also the greatest constitutional law film of all time,
Speaker 5: doesn't it in Australian cinema.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I'm trying to think of the others.
Speaker 5: Well, it's got them beaten by so much an even
Speaker 5: worth a contemp point not a contest. So I actually
Speaker 5: just watched it because my eldest is in year twelve
Speaker 5: and he's doing legal studies and the legal studies teacher
Speaker 5: said you should watch The Castle. Wow, So it became homework.
Speaker 5: So I was like, oh great. And the thing I
Speaker 5: loved about it was it's just as it's better than
Speaker 5: I remembered it. Yeah, which is rare, right, Very often
Speaker 5: you watch a film that you remember has been great
Speaker 5: and it's this great thing, it's this landmark cultural moment,
Speaker 5: which The Castle is. It's probably the most quoted Australian film.
Speaker 1: I have the Holy Trilogy of Australian comedies for Me
Speaker 1: at the Castle and no particularly ordered to be honest
Speaker 1: with the Castle, Crocodile Dundee and Murial's Wedding right, and
Speaker 1: all three of them are infinitely quotable.
Speaker 5: And they stand up, yes, all three of them. Yes,
Speaker 5: So I don't think I've seen Crocodile Dundee or Mural's.
Speaker 1: Wedding's wedding stars up really well, that's still really funny.
Speaker 1: He's got that added bonus of you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: Tony Collett and Rachel Griffith's Bill Hunters, one of our
Speaker 1: all time great actors. But Dan Wiley is in it.
Speaker 1: Julia Zamiro gave me Millgate, and it's got people you
Speaker 1: know who have gone on to become bigger names. And
Speaker 1: it's always fun but just so quotable, so funny and
Speaker 1: Crocodile Dundee. Some people have differing opinions on there's a
Speaker 1: couple of scenes. There's a scene in particular, which I
Speaker 1: think Paul Hogan wrote about in his biography and Biography
Speaker 1: that he Mick Dundee in a bar in New York
Speaker 1: meets a drag queen and kind of reaches underneath the check,
Speaker 1: and that's obviously been seeing something different.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 1: Paul Hogan defends it by saying, yeah, but this is
Speaker 1: a guy who has come from the out back.
Speaker 2: Elevators are weird to him.
Speaker 1: So this kind of idea that this could be happening
Speaker 1: is confusing. And he you know so anyway, but the
Speaker 1: Castle I watched recently and and I was because Sam
Speaker 1: Hag hadn't seen amazingly oh yeah episode.
Speaker 5: Actually that's really amazing that he hadn't seen it.
Speaker 2: Given that work with working Doug Guards the last fifteen years.
Speaker 1: It's it's it's amazing and and I would say reasonably insulted.
Speaker 1: So and so when I was watching it again, and
Speaker 1: I had watched it since I watched it many times
Speaker 1: over the years, but maybe before then, maybe it was
Speaker 1: like eight or so years. So and because also simply shot,
Speaker 1: you do wonder if it was going to date. But
Speaker 1: I had the same reaction as this going he just
Speaker 1: doesn't because it's so well written, it's so many jokes.
Speaker 1: The performances are great. Steve Carries gives one of the
Speaker 1: great comedic performance.
Speaker 5: It's really underrated his performance, I think, or maybe it isn't.
Speaker 5: Maybe I just underrated because when you watch it, it's all
Speaker 5: about Darryl Carrigan. Yeah, right, and so Michael Katin's just
Speaker 5: this amazing but it's such a great performance, and from
Speaker 5: the minute you see him, you just fall in love
Speaker 5: with him, and there's not a moment where you lose
Speaker 5: that fondness for him throughout the whole thing. So it's
Speaker 5: sort of easy, it seems to me, to skate through
Speaker 5: that film and think he's the guy and everyone else's
Speaker 5: sort of, you know, decoration. But there's something so brilliant
Speaker 5: about They've Courag's performance. And I'm not just saying this
Speaker 5: because I've met him and I know him, but like,
Speaker 5: I love Dale Kerrigan's literalism. It's just such a great
Speaker 5: comic device. So he will literally not retell anything without
Speaker 5: it being literally backed up by a word perfect quote
Speaker 5: that's his what he just said. You know, Dad's always
Speaker 5: saying that Steve's an ideas man. He's an ideas man.
Speaker 5: Steve like just sort of excessive literalism, which I think
Speaker 5: finds it's kind of highest expression in that moment where
Speaker 5: he's reading Wayne's words from prison back out to him
Speaker 5: and he's clearly written like there's just something so magnificent
Speaker 5: about that, And you're obviously far better place than me
Speaker 5: to explain what it is that is so comically ingenious
Speaker 5: about that whole performance. But everything he does is pure
Speaker 5: comedy without ever going for a punchline or anything like that.
Speaker 2: No, I mean, it's I think it's an un rated.
Speaker 1: Role and that people know that that character is really
Speaker 1: funny in that really funny movie. But I think I
Speaker 1: think what maybe people underestimate is the performance of it,
Speaker 1: which is slightly two different things, you know, and and
Speaker 1: he doesn't.
Speaker 2: You're absolutely right, he doesn't overplay it.
Speaker 1: And the pride he takes in I dug a hole
Speaker 1: is just so beautiful. But also he is there's a
Speaker 1: warmth to him as well. They don't, they don't cake
Speaker 1: on the emotion through through him. He's narrating it. We
Speaker 1: know that, but and you know he does speak about
Speaker 1: his you know, this complete love and unconditional love he
Speaker 1: has for his family. So there's a warmth that without
Speaker 1: it being kind of sackering, you know, at any point.
Speaker 1: And I mean, he's wanting to know what movies Sophiely
Speaker 1: and Eric Banner watched on the plane. He's just so
Speaker 1: beautiful and so funny and yeah, over the years it
Speaker 1: Remember I checkted some derision because some people thought it
Speaker 1: was looking down on those the opposite.
Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, so do I.
Speaker 5: In fact, I was talking to Susan as Susan wasn't
Speaker 5: really watching it, she was just floating in and out.
Speaker 5: But Chelsea knows it very well, and she just made
Speaker 5: an observation which I think I agreed with, which is
Speaker 5: it's actually a really interesting and good as well as
Speaker 5: sympathetic meditation on class in a way that you don't
Speaker 5: see anymore because we don't really do class. We don't
Speaker 5: do class actually in politics really, and we don't do
Speaker 5: class in our public discourse very much because class has
Speaker 5: been displaced by identity. So everything now is about identity,
Speaker 5: and every character is on some ideasity quest and casting
Speaker 5: is all about identity based diversity and all this sort
Speaker 5: of stuff. Right, So that's the big push of the
Speaker 5: political moment. But we kind of forget there's an era
Speaker 5: actually not very long ago, where the real engine of that,
Speaker 5: you know, of our political contest was about class. It's
Speaker 5: the way I illustrate this is Jimmy imagine Jimmy Barnes
Speaker 5: releasing working class man. Now it would be a ridiculous song,
Speaker 5: Like everyone would hear it and go, what the hell
Speaker 5: is that? And they would probably deride it for being
Speaker 5: some kind of expression of white privilege or something like,
Speaker 5: you know, celebrating the sort of white factory worker type thing,
Speaker 5: even though it doesn't declare himself as white. When I
Speaker 5: see you to imagine the working classman figure, that's what
Speaker 5: you're imagining. But it made perfect sense at that time,
Speaker 5: and so much artistic expression because so much culture was
Speaker 5: anchored in that had a big working class of people
Speaker 5: who worked in manufacturing or whatever or tow truck driving.
Speaker 5: This is the cause of it, and so that was
Speaker 5: actually kind of a relevant vector for our discussion. Whereas
Speaker 5: and so I don't know, I get people might say
Speaker 5: the film looks down on them, but I actually find
Speaker 5: you cannot help but love and admire them. Yes, they're naive,
Speaker 5: you know, they're very naive and thinking that, well, dad
Speaker 5: knows what he's doing, and so if he said this,
Speaker 5: well it'll be right, and it turns out he's not.
Speaker 5: And Okay, he doesn't know the law. And yes, there's
Speaker 5: an educated class that kind of runs things, that does
Speaker 5: understand things.
Speaker 2: A lot better.
Speaker 5: But in the end, the portrayal of a lot of
Speaker 5: that educated class isn't particularly sympathetic, like the lawyer in
Speaker 5: the High Court for the other side. And if I
Speaker 5: ask you, who are the people whose character you actually
Speaker 5: admire in this, it's basically Bud Tingwell and this family
Speaker 5: and Daryl Kerrigan, at least that's the way I say it.
Speaker 5: And so they're uncomplicated, but they have a kind of
Speaker 5: moral depth about them which you just don't see very often.
Speaker 5: I think that's kind of what makes the portrayal so sympathetic,
Speaker 5: is that you recognize them as good people, irrespective of
Speaker 5: how sharp their view of the world is or whatever
Speaker 5: they are. At bottom, they are good people.
Speaker 1: I love the fact that this was a floating observation
Speaker 1: by Susan as she walked through the room.
Speaker 2: As you were watching the castle.
Speaker 5: I embellished a little bit of it. I should have
Speaker 5: identified the point at which she stopped down. It's just
Speaker 5: a snapshot. It's a window onto how our house works.
Speaker 2: Bridgemy walk past and gone? Is that? Eric Bannett?
Speaker 5: Oh, can I say, by the way, while we're talking
Speaker 5: about the representation elements, and I don't know if this
Speaker 5: is a popular view or not. I quite like the
Speaker 5: representation of wogs in.
Speaker 2: This film, right, Okay, yes.
Speaker 5: I do, even though there are obvious things like for
Speaker 5: clearly is not Lebanese and speaks like a Greek, not
Speaker 5: like a Lebinar. Right, it's just not very obvious to me.
Speaker 5: But there's something again, very sympathetic and almost dignifying about
Speaker 5: the way these characters are presented. And they're presented as
Speaker 5: part of a working class solidarity, yeah, which I think
Speaker 5: is a really interesting area and quite a powerful area
Speaker 5: that we don't really talk about because again we've become
Speaker 5: very identity focused in the way we think about it.
Speaker 5: We think about, well, there's white people and then there's
Speaker 5: non white people like that are separate, but actually know
Speaker 5: that they are sharing a kind of material condition here
Speaker 5: that gives them an immediate solidarity and an immediate overlap
Speaker 5: in their lives. That means that Dale can be very
Speaker 5: understanding of them because they're actually in the same sort
Speaker 5: of situation. And then Eric Banner's character con what I
Speaker 5: love about him is he is this kickboxing Greek guy,
Speaker 5: but he's also he's very gentle. Yeah, is very considered.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is a credit to the airline.
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, it's all those sort of clothes and I
Speaker 5: know those people.
Speaker 1: Well this that that felt exactly how my my year
Speaker 1: level felt at school, like because there were the wogs
Speaker 1: and there were the skips, you know, and and there
Speaker 1: was absolute like affection towards each other, even though they
Speaker 1: would have to go up and play play soccer and
Speaker 1: go and play you know, a f l an occasionally
Speaker 1: you know, and some would you know, cross over, and
Speaker 1: it was all there was like a friendly competitiveness in
Speaker 1: a way, but there was absolute there was no tension
Speaker 1: between these groups that I ever felt. And this was
Speaker 1: this is not necessarily true of every year.
Speaker 5: Level, for every school.
Speaker 1: This is just my I can speak on my experience,
Speaker 1: and it was it was it was kind of we
Speaker 1: found joy in sometimes. Yeah, the way they had better
Speaker 1: lunches than we did. We had crappy lad wrap sandwich
Speaker 1: and they come with their tublewee containers full of pasta
Speaker 1: dishes and stuff, and you know, it was hilarious and
Speaker 1: we were envious. But that kind of like you know
Speaker 1: Darryl saying, you know, what is it with wogs and cash?
Speaker 1: That kind of stuff felt like the kind of observations
Speaker 1: that we were having. Even though you're kind of having
Speaker 1: a bit of a you know, a slight go it was.
Speaker 1: It was you were still inviting each other into your
Speaker 1: own homes and enjoying each other's comp And I.
Speaker 5: Don't feel like Daryl's having a go there, No, I
Speaker 5: think it's just bewildered. How do you drag out like this?
Speaker 5: But you know, but the other thing is I can
Speaker 5: tell you that wogs have exactly that conversation about themselves.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just it's just.
Speaker 5: Of course it's cash, that's the way, you know.
Speaker 8: Less.
Speaker 5: So after COVID, we.
Speaker 1: Best move on from the castle and let's talk about well,
Speaker 1: my favorite film of all time and the only movie
Speaker 1: I would say as a sequel Topples the film we're
Speaker 1: about to discuss and the Empire strikes Back is Godfather
Speaker 1: Part two.
Speaker 2: What a film.
Speaker 5: It is a great film. I will say my recollection
Speaker 5: of detail will probably be a bit sketchy because I've
Speaker 5: only seen it once and it was actually during the
Speaker 5: to say it was just last year, Yeah, during the
Speaker 5: big lockdown. So Susan and I had this thing where
Speaker 5: she just said, hey, let's just watch all those classic
Speaker 5: films that we never watched and I think we watched
Speaker 5: two and I know three, three, Godfather which I've never seen, Yes,
Speaker 5: Godfather Part two, Yes, which I've never seen, Citizen Kane,
Speaker 5: and then Citizen which I didn't really enjoy it. I
Speaker 5: felt like Citizen Kane, we're not going to talk about
Speaker 5: sitis in Kane was there, But I felt at the
Speaker 5: end of it, it's like, I'm prepared to accept this
Speaker 5: is a great film, but I suspect it's for all
Speaker 5: kinds of reasons that to do with that you would
Speaker 5: study in film school that I kind of now take
Speaker 5: for granted, and given I can't see them as new
Speaker 5: or fresh or innovative, I'm just left with the story,
Speaker 5: which I don't much care for. Right, That's kind of
Speaker 5: how I ended up. And so I'm not denying it's
Speaker 5: a great film. I just feel like you have to
Speaker 5: study its greatness rather than understand it you see it.
Speaker 5: Whereas with Godfather, I didn't feel that I loved Godfather one,
Speaker 5: so it's brilliant, and then two just blew me away,
Speaker 5: And I think, to me, it's probably the performances about No.
Speaker 5: There's two things about it. One is these are long
Speaker 5: films and at no point am I watching the clock.
Speaker 5: I'm completely engrossed. They seem to take their time with
Speaker 5: the film, the scenes breathe, but they remain magnetic at
Speaker 5: every stage. I'm completely there as they linger over things.
Speaker 5: Opportuno's just extraordinary from the first one. There's something about
Speaker 5: you know, I guess the narrative crudely is of a
Speaker 5: good guy who succumbs ultimately and turns bad. Yeah, that
Speaker 5: sort of thing, possibly for the sake of his family.
Speaker 5: But then that even itself becomes a bit corrupted. But
Speaker 5: he undergoes that transition with a remarkable continuity. It's still
Speaker 5: the same guy. Like, it's not like he changes so
Speaker 5: dramatically that it feels artificial in some way, or you know,
Speaker 5: he doesn't change. Yes, yes, on the spectrum of Opportuno
Speaker 5: to Yoda. Yes he's at the opposite.
Speaker 8: End of Yoda.
Speaker 5: But he I think there's just something. There's so much charisma.
Speaker 5: It's incredibly magnetic performance. But it's not he's not screaming
Speaker 5: at you. It's perfectly distilled, it's perfectly pitched. It's it's
Speaker 5: it's understated in a perhaps even in a Dale Harrigan
Speaker 5: sort of a way. And then and then Robert de
Speaker 5: Niro turns up and just what a performance.
Speaker 1: It's what elevates it for me that you get to
Speaker 1: these two amazing performances.
Speaker 2: I think Bachino is better than de Niro.
Speaker 1: I think de Niro kind of does this in his
Speaker 1: slyp To be honest, I don't think it's a particularly
Speaker 1: demanding role that's interested he's playing.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that might be true, but there's still so much
Speaker 5: restraint in it. There is there is what I mean something.
Speaker 2: And we've gone, we've gone.
Speaker 1: What I love about particularly watching Pacino, we've gotten particularly
Speaker 1: more than a de Niro got into that kind of
Speaker 1: who are stage in his career of a woman kind
Speaker 1: of you know stage and post that where it's so
Speaker 1: restraints seeing him from the first film into you know,
Speaker 1: and then you know, there are moments in the second
Speaker 1: and and and then the third where you do see
Speaker 1: him the bursts of anger come out, but it's earned
Speaker 1: and it's not you know, you know where he's come from,
Speaker 1: and he gets further more and more corrupt, and.
Speaker 5: It's a moment yes, because it's like, oh.
Speaker 1: God, yeah, yeah, well if you started, if al Pacino
Speaker 1: makes Godfather, you know, in twenty twenty one, he's saying
Speaker 1: the French for a couple, I've got some ideas.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, but I feel like that's true with both
Speaker 5: of them. Like if I probably more DeNiro than Pacino,
Speaker 5: but if I close my eyes and imagine those two
Speaker 5: actors and what's quintessential about them, you actually imagine them
Speaker 5: being quite big or at the very least very threatening
Speaker 5: or like something like that. DeNiro is not.
Speaker 2: Here's an ordinary guy, yeah.
Speaker 5: Who just makes one decision after another, and eventually those
Speaker 5: decisions become lethal. Yeah, but without a change in his demeanor,
Speaker 5: his facial expression even really it's just it's just this
Speaker 5: is the inevitable path that he kind of follows.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel like DeNiro, Yeah, he wasn't. He didn't,
Speaker 1: he didn't seek hour. It just kind of he saw
Speaker 1: something that was wrong, he did something about it, and
Speaker 1: then that just led to and we see the Domino
Speaker 1: effects a whole.
Speaker 8: Lot of wrong stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: But would you say the same as true of Pacto's character.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I guess you could argue if Sonny, Sonny
Speaker 1: doesn't get shot down at the toll booth and and
Speaker 1: and you know, his dad doesn't get shot the attempted
Speaker 1: assassination and on the street then he may stay where
Speaker 1: he was. Yeah, it's it's such a fascinating a film.
Speaker 1: And John gizl As as Fraido did that just did
Speaker 1: it break your heart?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I think so.
Speaker 2: I mean this scene that the news evening, Yeah, you
Speaker 2: know I knew it was you Yeah, yeah, just and
Speaker 2: then when you know, you know what's going to happen.
Speaker 5: Yes, that is you know, maybe that's the secret behind
Speaker 5: the Godfather is it's a genuine tragedy in the Greek sense.
Speaker 5: So like the idea of Greek tragedy was that you
Speaker 5: had these characters who had a fatal flaw and they
Speaker 5: would become tragic characters. But the thing about Greek tragedy
Speaker 5: was that that their tragic end was inevitable. It's not
Speaker 5: that this could have been prevented, it's this is fate.
Speaker 5: This is just the way that And I feel like
Speaker 5: that's kind of the maybe that that's what makes god
Speaker 5: the Godfather trilogy. Although I haven't seen the third, I
Speaker 5: should say that's what makes the Godfather trilogy work. It's
Speaker 5: got that Greek tragedy element. It's just the inevitability every
Speaker 5: character's trajectory. They're all transformation or transitional characters, and there's
Speaker 5: an inevitability about it. It's very hard to go back
Speaker 5: and say that could have been avoided. Really like, given
Speaker 5: who they are, even with their best intentions, this is
Speaker 5: what they were always gonna become. It's it's a good
Speaker 5: rendering of the idea of fate.
Speaker 1: And the idea that Michael Collone, who is supposedly all
Speaker 1: about family and the Colleanes have always been all about
Speaker 1: family with actually ordered the assassination of now his only brother.
Speaker 1: It's just it's so dark. It's amazing. You should watch three?
Speaker 2: Should I? I'm a bit I watched a recent franch
Speaker 2: for Coppler is recent First, Yes see that.
Speaker 5: I find this very well.
Speaker 1: You said, there's no you know, it's not quite like
Speaker 1: the Star Wars the Battle of Each Order. You watched
Speaker 1: the film Gym. It's the same film, but it's just
Speaker 1: the I can't I do find this. I really enjoyed
Speaker 1: recently watching The Coder, which is part three. So and
Speaker 1: full disclosure, it was in preparation to interview Francis for Coppola.
Speaker 5: So is that the greatest moment of you?
Speaker 1: That when I got that email saying are you free?
Speaker 1: To interview fand for a couple you know occasionally, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we get those opportunities and you know, yeah, well, yes,
Speaker 1: I don't even have to check.
Speaker 5: My I remember how excited I was that you were
Speaker 5: getting to do that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: So, but this is my worry is if I watch
Speaker 5: the new cast or whatever you call it, am I
Speaker 5: denying the only chance I really have to watch the trilogy?
Speaker 1: And then the way the counterpoint to that is this
Speaker 1: is frends for Coupler's vision. I wonder if you watched
Speaker 1: it the the original version first, and you are denying
Speaker 1: yourself to see Coppler's vision as he intended.
Speaker 5: So I have a unique opportunity that very few others have.
Speaker 2: Exactly right.
Speaker 5: It's a good point. I'll have to think about this.
Speaker 2: Let us know how you go. Malcolm X.
Speaker 1: Yes, just a nice, little breezy, little light reading like reading.
Speaker 1: So I watched Malcolm X. I think when it came out,
Speaker 1: I think it was a bit above me. I didn't
Speaker 1: quite understand it all, Yeah, I must. I haven't gone
Speaker 1: back to revisit it, and I've been enjoying learning through
Speaker 1: TV more about Malcolm X. Through the series. I'mously you've
Speaker 1: seen the Godfather of Harlem. Oh no, I haven'tly It's
Speaker 1: quite quite fascinating through that, So I'll be keen to
Speaker 1: go back and watch Malcolm X.
Speaker 2: So Denzel Washington as Malcolm X.
Speaker 5: Yes, who was incredible Spike Lee film. Obviously first film
Speaker 5: I ever saw in the movie theater that had an intermission.
Speaker 2: Oh, was so remarkable.
Speaker 5: I wasn't expecting it. It's like three hours twenty or something.
Speaker 2: It's a very long That's why I haven't gone back
Speaker 2: in the movie.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, And to be fair, I haven't watched
Speaker 5: it for a very long time. I watched I started
Speaker 5: watching it again last year and got maybe half hour
Speaker 5: an hour in or something, and then something happened the
Speaker 5: way and I suspect if I watched it now, I
Speaker 5: wouldn't be It probably wouldn't make this list. I could
Speaker 5: probably go it's not blowing me away, But for me,
Speaker 5: this is a nostalgic call, or maybe a contemporaneous call.
Speaker 5: So I watched it was ninety three. I reckon when
Speaker 5: I watched it. I think it might have come out
Speaker 5: ninety three, so I was in year nine and it
Speaker 5: was just one of those ones that blew my mind
Speaker 5: and I'd never really known much about Malcolm X. I'd
Speaker 5: never heard a great deal of his story, but then
Speaker 5: all of a sudden, he was everywhere because this film
Speaker 5: came out. Alex Haley's autobiography of Malcolm X came out.
Speaker 5: I read that. I remember doing a book report on
Speaker 5: that at school, where you had to do a report
Speaker 5: on a book you just read for five minutes, and
Speaker 5: I think I took fifty to do it. I was
Speaker 5: just completely immersed in this character.
Speaker 1: He's almost lost in the shadow of Martin Luther King,
Speaker 1: wasn't he like it felt from my perspective that I knew.
Speaker 1: I felt like I knew it quite a bit about
Speaker 1: Martin Luther King, you know, the circumstances of his assassination
Speaker 1: through you know, also, I was a youtwo fan, so
Speaker 1: you know we had pride.
Speaker 2: Yeah of course, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: So and then I remember when Malcolm X came out,
Speaker 1: I was like, who's this guy?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah, And you know, if well, here we can get
Speaker 5: into an endless political argument about this, one version of
Speaker 5: that would be well, of course, Martin Luther King is
Speaker 5: the more celebrated figure because he's the more palatable figure
Speaker 5: to white people, right, whereas Malcolm X was more hardline,
Speaker 5: much more militant. But I think that reading probably overlooks
Speaker 5: a couple of things. Yeah, I think that underplays Martin
Speaker 5: Luther King's considerable achievements. But also I think and I
Speaker 5: think this is really unfortunate, especially for me watching this
Speaker 5: film as a Muslim. Is it sort of leaves out
Speaker 5: to some extent that the last period of his life
Speaker 5: where he he goes to the pilgrimage in Mecca, which
Speaker 5: is a very controversial thing because he's come from this group,
Speaker 5: the Nation of Islam, which borrows the name of Islam
Speaker 5: but really theologically has nothing to.
Speaker 1: Do right in Godfather parm He's part of that, yeah,
Speaker 1: of course, and he's trying to He's also using Muhammad
Speaker 1: Ali to kind of like who.
Speaker 5: Makes the same journey? Yeah, yeah, yeah, And so there's
Speaker 5: a like, all the focus on Malcolm X's life is
Speaker 5: really on that notion of Islam period really, and I
Speaker 5: can completely understand that because that's sort of the height
Speaker 5: of his activism and particularly the more militant aspects of
Speaker 5: his activism, but his whole life journey, you can't leave
Speaker 5: out the bit where he leaves that behind, right, So
Speaker 5: he goes to the pilgrimage and Mecca. Only Muslims can
Speaker 5: go on this pilgrimage. So the fact the authorities let
Speaker 5: him in is a big call, right, because he's not
Speaker 5: really a Muslim in the traditional sense.
Speaker 7: Right.
Speaker 5: He's part of this group that theologically would hold all
Speaker 5: kinds of positions that are completely opposite of Islamic teaching,
Speaker 5: including having a new prophet and all sorts of just
Speaker 5: stuff that is just not at all part of the
Speaker 5: traditional Islam. So anyway, he goes there, but he's blown
Speaker 5: away by this experience of going to Mecca and seeing
Speaker 5: the whole world gathered. They're all different races and so on,
Speaker 5: unified by something, and it changes his perspective on things
Speaker 5: quite radically. And so he ends up becoming an Orthodox Muslim,
Speaker 5: and his name, he changes his name from Malcolm X
Speaker 5: to Madica Schabas, and where he ends up is a
Speaker 5: very different play. It's probably actually quite a bit closer
Speaker 5: to Martin Luther King Jr. But I kind of feel
Speaker 5: like you end up with this thing where it kind
Speaker 5: of suits everybody to ignore that bit and say he's
Speaker 5: different to Martin Luther King either, because it allows you
Speaker 5: to forget him, or it allows you to celebrate and
Speaker 5: elevate his more millicant approach in distinction to Martin Luther King,
Speaker 5: when actually his final destinations very different to that.
Speaker 1: It's interesting because we have because as a when when
Speaker 1: this came out, this old have been eighteen but leading
Speaker 1: into you know, hearing about the film maybe things that
Speaker 1: as they do arising books and you know, before the
Speaker 1: movie gets released, you know, hearing Martin Malcolm X. It
Speaker 1: was very much Martin Luther King did it one way
Speaker 1: and which is a non violent way, and Malcolm xit
Speaker 1: the other way, which.
Speaker 2: Is the violent way. And that was what you were told.
Speaker 1: And you would think Spike Lee, and we often speak
Speaker 1: on edit or even more so off air about there's
Speaker 1: no room for nuance in today's commentary, but you would
Speaker 1: think you would hope that someone like Spike Lee would
Speaker 1: find time in the three and a half hour film
Speaker 1: to have more nuance.
Speaker 5: And I think he does. This is the thing, you know,
Speaker 5: I think his final transition is really powerful, like right,
Speaker 5: you know, there's scenes of him on HUDJ in Mecca
Speaker 5: are there that that full story is told, and then
Speaker 5: obviously right up to the point where he gets assassinated you. So, yeah,
Speaker 5: I don't put any of this on Sparkley, you know,
Speaker 5: I think, And like I say, I walked away turbo
Speaker 5: charged by this film. Like you imagine Year nine, I'm
Speaker 5: kind of really ready for that sort of thing. I'm
Speaker 5: growing up in an overwhelmingly white so a suburb, coming
Speaker 5: to overwhelmingly white school. It was me and a few
Speaker 5: Vietnamese kids, and that was kind of it, you know,
Speaker 5: and it meant a lot to me, right, And that
Speaker 5: was around the time when do you remember those caps
Speaker 5: that just had an X on them. Yeah, they were
Speaker 5: kind of really becoming quite big, and so I remember
Speaker 5: getting one of those and I'd wear it wherever.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 5: It's probably my only real moment of rebellion at school
Speaker 5: was I decided I'd just wear it at school, even
Speaker 5: though caps weren't allowed, and I remember being told off
Speaker 5: about that. I was.
Speaker 2: Headline.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think it was the day I decided to
Speaker 5: do that was either the anniversary of his birthday or
Speaker 5: his death, I can't remember.
Speaker 2: And it was schedule closed days.
Speaker 5: I mean, there was a whole lot it was where
Speaker 5: your cap the school day? But that's not let's leave
Speaker 5: that out, you know. And I definitely related to the
Speaker 5: kind of you know, more rebellious, radical streak in him, which,
Speaker 5: especially when you're in year nine, is there's something very
Speaker 5: appealing about that, especially when you grow up as a
Speaker 5: racial minority in a situation like that. But I think
Speaker 5: because I'm a Muslim as well, there was always that
Speaker 5: bit that was also a thing that made him more
Speaker 5: attractive to me than Martin Luther King because the King juniors,
Speaker 5: obviously Christian Minister Malcolm X tends out to be Muslim.
Speaker 5: So I'm kind of like, well that he's kind of
Speaker 5: my guy. But the end part of his journey meant
Speaker 5: a lot to me as well because of that, which
Speaker 5: is probably true for me in a way that may
Speaker 5: not be true for other non white or black kids
Speaker 5: who are watching his whole story. They might find that
Speaker 5: the jelly is the the Nation of Islam part of it.
Speaker 2: So we spoke.
Speaker 1: We had Diane and Ewan Vietnamese, a strange woman who
Speaker 1: actress fantastic a couple of weeks ago, and we spoke about,
Speaker 1: you know, the Asian representation on screen and seeing you know,
Speaker 1: how big Bruce Lee was in her family because you know,
Speaker 1: her dad said this is look this is us, you know,
Speaker 1: and how exciting that.
Speaker 2: Was for Muslims. What you know, what a Muslim seeing
Speaker 2: on screen that reflect their experiences for them?
Speaker 5: Yeah, not much, I mean, and again Muslims is a
Speaker 5: very broad category, so there are subsets within it. So
Speaker 5: I think Arabs in particular, who you know, there are
Speaker 5: obviously a lot of Christian Arabs as well, but Muslim
Speaker 5: Arabs especially because the whole terrorism thing, I think Arab
Speaker 5: depiction on screen has tended just to be that, which
Speaker 5: is one of the reasons. Also I quite like for
Speaker 5: Rick in the Castle because he's prepared to play with
Speaker 5: that to punk other people. You know, it says, I
Speaker 5: know a guy, I'll come and put a bomb under
Speaker 5: your house, and then I don't, but you know you're Marrab,
Speaker 5: so he assumes. It's just a really like that little moment.
Speaker 5: So there's moments like that you can like to. I
Speaker 5: remember it was a YouTube video going around probably ten
Speaker 5: years ago called Planet of the Arabs, and it was
Speaker 5: just like all the Hollywood depiction of Arabs, It's plushed
Speaker 5: up and it's just it's what.
Speaker 8: You would expect.
Speaker 2: It's totally horrific.
Speaker 5: So that was the representation for a very long time,
Speaker 5: and then it's you started starting to see things. So
Speaker 5: like a show like Rami, which I think divides Muslims
Speaker 5: actually because some of the way it tackles some sorts
Speaker 5: of issues, but there's no doubt it's a form of representation.
Speaker 5: And one of the things, one of the best defenses
Speaker 5: of that from a Muslim point of view that I've
Speaker 5: read was that whatever you want to say about this
Speaker 5: character or you know, particularly the use of sex scenes
Speaker 5: I think is quite controversial for Muslims in the times,
Speaker 5: but whatever you want to say about this, it's a
Speaker 5: faith positive show, as in it's it starts from a
Speaker 5: position of saying that he's trying to figure out what
Speaker 5: his relationship to Islam is, but at no point is
Speaker 5: he blaming Islam for all his problems, which is actually
Speaker 5: the depiction that I think a lot of even like
Speaker 5: progressive Western literature and film and television that thinks it's
Speaker 5: being sympathetic. That's kind of the position it would take,
Speaker 5: because if I think that they could shake off this
Speaker 5: Islam thing, then then you know, like you know that
Speaker 5: we don't need to demonize them, we just need to
Speaker 5: turn them into us. You know, that sort of thing,
Speaker 5: and so that's a defense around me that I think
Speaker 5: is an interesting defense. So there's shows like that, the
Speaker 5: show that, oh sorry, a film that I don't even
Speaker 5: remember if I've spoken to you about this or not.
Speaker 5: Is it three lines?
Speaker 2: Four lines?
Speaker 8: Four lines?
Speaker 5: Three lines? Is the name? The name of the football team,
Speaker 5: the Englis football team, three Lions, with Riz Ahmad and
Speaker 5: so on. I know a lot of really loved that
Speaker 5: because it was in a dark period. It's the war
Speaker 5: on terror, and here is a terrorism comedy film and
Speaker 5: showing this sort of bumbling group of homegrown terrorsts who
Speaker 5: just can't do anything right. But they sort of look
Speaker 5: like and sound like some of the people that we
Speaker 5: know in the way that just the level of naivity
Speaker 5: and you know, all that sort of stuff. Even as
Speaker 5: there's sort of being attracted to this more radical political position,
Speaker 5: they remain comic characters. And it's just I think it's
Speaker 5: just very very well done. So I haven't it's not
Speaker 5: like I've run around the whole Muslim community asking everyone
Speaker 5: what they think of that film, But whenever that's come
Speaker 5: up amongst Muslims, they've all loved that film because it's
Speaker 5: just I think it it permits a different reaction to
Speaker 5: the whole War on Terrors, like IIST than any other
Speaker 5: thing permitted at that time, and so there's a level
Speaker 5: of representation there. But beyond that, yeah, I don't think
Speaker 5: it's I don't think it's huge. I think in some
Speaker 5: ways a lot of the new identity diversity push that's
Speaker 5: happened doesn't really involve Muslims. It's like it involves people
Speaker 5: of color. It involves a lot obviously around gender and
Speaker 5: things like that, but Muslims as a category, I think
Speaker 5: just get subsumed into the people of color thing as
Speaker 5: far as that's concerned. And so some Muslims might take
Speaker 5: their representational cues from that. But Muslims as Muslims, I
Speaker 5: think they're not quite invited to that party. I don't
Speaker 5: think for I think lots of reasons that are complicated.
Speaker 5: That's another essay.
Speaker 2: But I didn't spot one in the Empire strikes back,
Speaker 2: that's for sure.
Speaker 5: Can I say one thing though, I am convinced that
Speaker 5: Jedi are based on particular Islamic Sufi groups, And this
Speaker 5: is a big thing actually in the Muslim community. Even
Speaker 5: the robes they wear they're very Moroccan. So if you
Speaker 5: go down that whole. Yeah, I think you'll find a lot.
Speaker 1: Well, I think George Lucas did take from a variety
Speaker 1: of like he went shopping, he went, he went, you know,
Speaker 1: there's there's like almost some Samurai kind of stuff in
Speaker 1: there as well, you know, and so it would.
Speaker 2: Not surprise me if he's borrowed some stuff there. Absolutely.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I don't think Yoda he's got more of a Buddhist vibe.
Speaker 5: Possibly possibly does he ever articulate a theology?
Speaker 2: Well, he's he's it's all, it's just Jedi. Yeah, that's his,
Speaker 2: and that's his religion, that's his.
Speaker 5: He's the census thing a few years ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you under started that.
Speaker 1: All right, Let's okay, let's let's say we have a
Speaker 1: quick break and then we'll come back and chat about
Speaker 1: Empire strikes Back.
Speaker 2: All right, mate, I want to know what do you
Speaker 2: think of it?
Speaker 5: I enjoyed it.
Speaker 2: I did. Enjoyed it.
Speaker 5: I did. I'm trying to figure out whether I prefer
Speaker 5: this or Star Wars, right, And it's really hard to
Speaker 5: compare because I come to Star Wars completely cold. So
Speaker 5: a whole lot of stuff is being introduced, and I
Speaker 5: quite enjoy that process. I would say, and this is
Speaker 5: based purely on a first watch in Fire Strikes Back
Speaker 5: feels more like an action film, right than a narrative film,
Speaker 5: even though there are obviously narrative elements. A lot of
Speaker 5: the film is taken up with action sequences, like things
Speaker 5: flying in the sky, is shooting at other things, flying
Speaker 5: through asteroid belts and all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1: Yes, it's funny because this is almost like a Star
Speaker 1: Wars film compared to the other ones in reverse, like
Speaker 1: you have. It starts quite bombastic and the Empire are
Speaker 1: striking back on Hearth and the Rebels get blown out
Speaker 1: of Harth, and it's very action heavy at the start,
Speaker 1: but then it becomes much more personal.
Speaker 2: There's no there's no battle sequence, yes, and that's true.
Speaker 1: In the end, it becomes about the small intimate scenes
Speaker 1: withd Hahn getting betrayed and then and then the carbon
Speaker 1: freeze and then the revelation between Luke and Darth. So
Speaker 1: it becomes you know, it's it becomes a Lindy Body endivisuy.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Actually that's probably a good observation. Maybe I formed
Speaker 5: that view that I had early on. It was like,
Speaker 5: oh god, it's all action seqences, but the reason I
Speaker 5: raise it, and this is entirely on me, is I'm
Speaker 5: a very bad action watcher.
Speaker 2: You mentioned this in their last time.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so when I see action sequences, my brain just
Speaker 5: seems to switch off. And then when there's dialogue again,
Speaker 5: I'm like, oh okay. So I found it hard to
Speaker 5: get into until it reached that aspect of it. There
Speaker 5: were bits that were cool, like you know when they
Speaker 5: tie the cable around those big machines so they fall
Speaker 5: over and all that sort of stuff. Yeah, things like
Speaker 5: that were pretty cool. I really like the asteroid belt stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I love C three Po's constant use of probability.
Speaker 1: I made a note of that because it's one of
Speaker 1: the great thing. Is what a great tool to have,
Speaker 1: you know that you've invented yourself to have a character
Speaker 1: point out the stakes.
Speaker 5: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: To the audience.
Speaker 1: So yeah, we know okay, and we already have a
Speaker 1: sense that this is heading into danger. But for three
Speaker 1: PO to kind of say, well, these are the actual.
Speaker 5: Odds, yeah, yeah, which is not helping anybody. I mean,
Speaker 5: I suppose it's because he's trying to advise against it,
Speaker 5: isn't it. Yes, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid
Speaker 5: because it is approximately three seven hundred and twenty to one.
Speaker 5: Never tell me, be Eydes, but I quite like those
Speaker 5: that sort of little thing because yeah, you're right, maybe
Speaker 5: that's what it was. And I hadn't really figured out
Speaker 5: why I liked it, but it's it's that device. Yeah,
Speaker 5: that's there, and it does it sort of really declares
Speaker 5: in a very explicit way the improbability of what's about
Speaker 5: to happen. I mean, it's really only Divide intervention that
Speaker 5: can make this happen, right, Yeah, it's that level. So yeah,
Speaker 5: I mean those sorts of things I really enjoyed. And
Speaker 5: then the Lukyoda thing. I mean, to me, that's the
Speaker 5: centerpiece of the film.
Speaker 1: I'm well, I mean, yes, there's that, but there's also
Speaker 1: the betrayal at Cloud City and the carbon freeze. But
Speaker 1: that's why what I got out of this, and I
Speaker 1: had watched it for a while. I've always said Empire
Speaker 1: is my favorite Star Wars. I said, bound to watch
Speaker 1: it the kind of thing. Okay, have I just been
Speaker 1: saying it for so long that I just kind of
Speaker 1: believe it is, or it's time to challenge that again
Speaker 1: by watching it again for the first time.
Speaker 2: It's probably ten years and I loved it.
Speaker 1: I was just totally into it, really enjoyed every minute
Speaker 1: of it.
Speaker 2: But what got me from the start was the economy.
Speaker 1: I'm always interested when somebody does a sequel, how they
Speaker 1: reintroduce the characters again. Sometimes it feels a bit ham fisted,
Speaker 1: it feels a bit forced. But I thought the economy
Speaker 1: of how we kind of reunite with the gang, it
Speaker 1: was really good.
Speaker 2: Luke.
Speaker 1: You know, it's almost immediately you know, has his hands
Speaker 1: tied with the the womper?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Is that?
Speaker 5: And but what, by the way, was the point of
Speaker 5: that whole episode?
Speaker 1: Well, possibly just an action that there's there's a rumor
Speaker 1: that Mark Hamill, between the filming of Star Wars and
Speaker 1: New Hope and then by strikes Back was involved in
Speaker 1: a car accident was a reasonably serious and there was
Speaker 1: a rumor that was to cover like a scar that
Speaker 1: he had. George Lucas has denied that, saying the scar
Speaker 1: was barely visible by the time they started to shooting.
Speaker 1: But I do wonder if you're writing and you know
Speaker 1: this has happened, it seems a reasonable coincidence.
Speaker 2: And he does get slashed across the chief yeah, and
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 7: So.
Speaker 2: I watching it again.
Speaker 1: You know, this is you know, forty years ago, now
Speaker 1: forty one years ago this film was released. I think
Speaker 1: you could have gotten more tension out of that Wamper scene.
Speaker 1: Even when he's trying to get his lightsaber. He gets
Speaker 1: in reasonably like reasonably good time to kind of.
Speaker 2: Like yeah, like the womer should have got.
Speaker 1: Closer to him as a you know, just it could
Speaker 1: have maximized the tension and that. But this, you know,
Speaker 1: the characters Luke, he's in the blizzard and he gets
Speaker 1: caught Hahn saying goodbye. He's explained that he's got to
Speaker 1: go pay off Jaba. He has a fight Layer and
Speaker 1: then R two and three po informed that Hahn informed
Speaker 1: Hard that Luke is missing, and so Hahn goes off
Speaker 1: looking for Luke. And what I like about this is
Speaker 1: it it reminds us that Hahn actually cares. He's not
Speaker 1: you know, he has come a long way. He's not
Speaker 1: just a scoms because Layers accusing him of being, you know,
Speaker 1: just all about the money and and but he does
Speaker 1: actually care. When he finds out Luke, he doesn't hesitate,
Speaker 1: looks looks missing. I want to play you your cheers
Speaker 1: at all.
Speaker 5: Only bits and pieces. I've seen a few episodes here.
Speaker 1: And there, but okay with it made not mean as
Speaker 1: much as it might to us. But you probably won't
Speaker 1: recognize the voice. But won't you?
Speaker 2: I want to play you a bit and see if
Speaker 2: you do recognize this voice at all, Your.
Speaker 3: Highness, there's nothing more we could do to name the
Speaker 3: shielders must be closed, close the doors.
Speaker 1: Yes, sir, do you recognize that voice?
Speaker 5: Don't sure?
Speaker 1: That is the voice of Cliff Claven himself from Cheers
Speaker 1: John Ratzenberger.
Speaker 2: Yes, how is that his voice?
Speaker 7: Well?
Speaker 1: John Ratzenberger is almost in every Pixar film, but he's
Speaker 1: almost a lucky charm. He's well, yeah, so he's obviously
Speaker 1: a great voice actor. So the voice we hear as
Speaker 1: Cliff Claven in Cheers for over you know, twelve years
Speaker 1: over long that to come Ran Ran, it's him, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's him.
Speaker 2: It's him acting.
Speaker 5: That's amazing because when I think of his voice, I
Speaker 5: think it's like JUGGI Bear. Yeah, like he would do
Speaker 5: a great Yogi beart.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know, he's got very in Cheers at least,
Speaker 1: Clif's a very distinctive action and voice so yes, one
Speaker 1: for the cheers fans.
Speaker 5: This is for the TV podcast that you're about. What
Speaker 5: do you mean you haven't watched?
Speaker 1: You watch every episode of something before you come in
Speaker 1: and then we'll discuss it. I think I love this
Speaker 1: also because this is one of the few films Star
Speaker 1: Wars films where Tatooine is not involved, particularly when this
Speaker 1: film was made. It's the first one that didn't involve
Speaker 1: Tatouoin Luke's home planet and an Anakin's home planet. So
Speaker 1: I like this the aesthetic this we we saw half basically,
Speaker 1: when you think of Empire, you think of Hearth, you
Speaker 1: think of the Dagabar swamp, and you think of cloud City.
Speaker 5: Because that's it. That's pretty much it, apart from the
Speaker 5: stars bit.
Speaker 2: That's yea the stars and then you know.
Speaker 5: And it felt like a very deliberate choice to me
Speaker 5: because the first first one is a desert and it's
Speaker 5: just playing with different extremes.
Speaker 1: Right, Yes, And I think Luks George Lucas believed that
Speaker 1: he wanted to make everybody. He wanted to challenge the
Speaker 1: art department. He thought it's harder to cheat action sequences
Speaker 1: in snow. That's interesting white background, so I wanted to
Speaker 1: kind of set that challenge for them.
Speaker 5: So this comes back to my I don't know if
Speaker 5: I said this last time or not, but I do
Speaker 5: feel like the primary appeal of Star Wars remains esthetic
Speaker 5: that if you imagine watching this as a kid, and
Speaker 5: I think in a way, these are kids films, yes.
Speaker 2: Yes, and everyone should remember that when they.
Speaker 5: Watch Yeah, when they're watching it as twenty years later, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 5: And so part of me imagines that as I'm trying
Speaker 5: to watch it and go, Okay, so what does twelve
Speaker 5: year old me think as I'm watching this and I
Speaker 5: even get moments of it, like at the very start
Speaker 5: where that the introductions scroll through, I kind of felt
Speaker 5: this weird nostalgic excitement even though I'd never watched this film,
Speaker 5: because it was to me it's the same era as
Speaker 5: Christopher Reeves Superman, right, and it's like, oh my god,
Speaker 5: I have that feeling or what that that was. Things
Speaker 5: were so exciting then when you saw a picture of space,
Speaker 5: it was like the most exciting thing ever. And if
Speaker 5: you import that into this film, Corse, it's the most
Speaker 5: exciting thing ever, because you know, watching a whole thing
Speaker 5: that's like it's Star Wars. This is you know so.
Speaker 1: Well even in the scroll on those it says like
Speaker 1: the evil lord Darth Vader. Now, if this was a
Speaker 1: film directed at adults and you know, then they're not
Speaker 1: pointing out, you know, Darth Vader is evil from because
Speaker 1: we've seen that the prequel. It's just that language even suggests.
Speaker 5: It's a good versus evil situation. You shouldn't be looking
Speaker 5: for nuanced complexity and all these characters, although the Father
Speaker 5: Something maybe has a little bit. But yeah, So I
Speaker 5: think the principle appeal is aesthetic, which I think really
Speaker 5: works because the thing about Hoth is it's so uncomfortably cold,
Speaker 5: but it is great to look at, but the minute
Speaker 5: you look at it, you're feeling something because of the
Speaker 5: weather extremes. And then it's juxtaposed this sort of cold,
Speaker 5: almost prehistoric setting where you could imagine a willing mammoth
Speaker 5: sort of walking around, is juxtaposed with this high tech
Speaker 5: sort of laser beams that you know, all that that
Speaker 5: sort of that action rasmeatas So I can immediately see
Speaker 5: why this got its hooks into into kids around that time,
Speaker 5: especially because nothing has been seen like that. At the
Speaker 5: same time, it's got those weird Star Wars characteristics, Like
Speaker 5: remember last time I spoke about how the blowing up
Speaker 5: the Death Star just happens really really quickly in a
Speaker 5: perfunctory sort of a way. I feel like the same
Speaker 5: thing happens here. So you've referred to it already with
Speaker 5: you know, the way Luke gets the lightsaber and fights
Speaker 5: there what do they call whampers. Yeah, but even the
Speaker 5: moment where Luke gets found, I'm just sitting there going,
Speaker 5: hang on, shouldn't this be some big dramatic moment And
Speaker 5: all you get is a radio signal comes back and says, oh,
Speaker 5: they found like they're coming in now. Okay, great. It's
Speaker 5: just how did that happen? Why was there no build up?
Speaker 1: Well, I've spoken about it before on this podcast in
Speaker 1: the seventies, and this is eighty, so you know it
Speaker 1: gets released in eighty There's get in a map like yeah,
Speaker 1: they about the Jaws. Yeah, like they kill the shark
Speaker 1: and then they don't even show the reunions. When they
Speaker 1: get back to the they kill a shaking their swimming
Speaker 1: back and it's credits, you know, So I think also
Speaker 1: they probably know this is this is an entree, Like
Speaker 1: there's gonna be bigger threats. In the Womper, there was
Speaker 1: a scene where there's because there's a there's a group
Speaker 1: of Whompers and they kind of invade, or at least
Speaker 1: some of them have been held held captive in like
Speaker 1: a in the in the jail, in a prison cell
Speaker 1: in the rebel base, and they get out getting out,
Speaker 1: and if you go on YouTube, you can find these
Speaker 1: scenes of the Wompers trying to and it's when.
Speaker 2: Layer and Hahn are having their kind of bust up.
Speaker 1: And and they're yelling matching the corridors there and as
Speaker 1: that's kind of happening, a Womper is trying to get in,
Speaker 1: and I think it ends with three PO.
Speaker 2: Hahn and Laid don't go in.
Speaker 1: I think three pair of warns them not to go
Speaker 1: into that that door, not to open that door because
Speaker 1: that's the other prison cell. Don't open the door, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then three PO takes off the office science and
Speaker 1: do not enter and then walks away. And the storm
Speaker 1: trip is going because the storm ships are invading and
Speaker 1: dart Vade is also invading on the and all the
Speaker 1: has been taken out. I also just want to play
Speaker 1: a quick grab of Layer and Hahn because that that
Speaker 1: has been truncated. But I thought there's some interesting stuff
Speaker 1: in the heart and layer Buster, thank you to see me.
Speaker 7: I'm working.
Speaker 9: I can arrange that.
Speaker 7: Chance.
Speaker 5: This're so busy door.
Speaker 7: You haven't learned how to be a woman.
Speaker 2: I could have helped you, but it's too late. You
Speaker 2: pick up Tu and he's flying out of here, sweetheart.
Speaker 7: Right now, I.
Speaker 2: Think I can survive.
Speaker 9: Good luck.
Speaker 4: I don't care about all those people depending on me.
Speaker 2: Please don't tell me about the rebellion again.
Speaker 5: Don't you think about anything else. I'm sorry what you
Speaker 5: call is this plot?
Speaker 7: And you think if you're the one to buy some I.
Speaker 5: Could, but I'm not really interested anymore.
Speaker 7: We'll meet again.
Speaker 6: Maybe by then you'll have warmed up a little.
Speaker 1: You have all the breeding of the band, just as
Speaker 1: much a chup joy. I think there was a desire
Speaker 1: to because obviously that there's more tension to be had
Speaker 1: with the Wompers, and if they're invading the base, and
Speaker 1: there's a scene where like one of them.
Speaker 2: Is pretty puts his claw or through the through the wall, but.
Speaker 1: There must have been a desire to move this story
Speaker 1: on quicker than they had And and and you know,
Speaker 1: you always remember that they're shooting on film, so.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you can't just do it over and over and over.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, and also they don't nessarily see exactly what
Speaker 1: they've gone. They had monitors, I should they had monitors
Speaker 1: back then, but they also that they were shooting in Norway. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I imagine a rebel base was probably done in England
Speaker 1: where they shot. Yeah, maybe when they got back they
Speaker 1: may have seen the wamp that womper and look seen
Speaker 1: and gone. We probably could of had him get a
Speaker 1: little bit closer.
Speaker 2: Or maybe not. I don't know, but there certainly obviously
Speaker 2: a desire to move this story along.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but that's what made me bewildered by the start
Speaker 5: of it. So it was like like, I s you've
Speaker 5: set up this big thing, looks lost in the thing,
Speaker 5: and then it serves no purpose in the rest of
Speaker 5: the story, and the climax to it is over. Kind
Speaker 5: of like that, now your scar thing makes perfect sense.
Speaker 5: That makes a lot more sense of it. But I
Speaker 5: think the weirdest thing I find about Star Wars is
Speaker 5: the rhythm of it. It feels slow where I would
Speaker 5: expect it to be fast, and it feels fast where
Speaker 5: I would expect it to be slight and more dramatic,
Speaker 5: And now I don't know if that's an error thing.
Speaker 5: So it's just because I'm watching in twenty twenty one
Speaker 5: and this film made in nineteen eighty, and actually that's
Speaker 5: a very nineteen eighty thing to do. Or it's particularly
Speaker 5: George Lucas and just his brain just works on a
Speaker 5: different realm.
Speaker 1: It certainly never felt slowed lights of late to me
Speaker 1: watching it, watching it. When I watched it, did you
Speaker 1: watch it? I don't think I watched it in the cinema.
Speaker 1: I think I spade about this last time I had
Speaker 1: I almost had revisionism, where I assumed I watched all
Speaker 1: the Star Wars films in the cinema. I definitely saw
Speaker 1: Return of the Jedi in the cinemas. But I suspect
Speaker 1: I saw Empire Strikes Back on video because it came
Speaker 1: out in eighty I was five, probably not anything else
Speaker 1: to when Star Wars comes out. So but it never
Speaker 1: it never felt slow to me. It kind of just
Speaker 1: felt magical and fast and yeah, yeah, yeah. So Luke
Speaker 1: goes to to Dagabar. He's got a complete training with Yoda.
Speaker 2: He rise.
Speaker 1: We've spoken a little bit about Yoda. There's a couple
Speaker 1: of things that I do love. I do love that
Speaker 1: transition from bumbling to like no, And it's just just
Speaker 1: from a work of if you watch it, and the
Speaker 1: the work that Frank Oz is doing with his face
Speaker 1: like by this stage. I think also what it does
Speaker 1: is I think he goes from being feeling like he
Speaker 1: is a puppet. Yes, so oh no, I can kind
Speaker 1: of understand. I can see him now and he feels real.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2: And I think he does it. There's a couple of things.
Speaker 1: One when he warns h look, he has a little
Speaker 1: chat with Look, let's have a listened to Yoda and
Speaker 1: Luke can't it's too big.
Speaker 7: Size matters not look at me, judge me by my size,
Speaker 7: do you m M? And where you should not? For
Speaker 7: my ally is the force and the powerful it is life,
Speaker 7: greets makes it grow, It's energy surround rush.
Speaker 2: And bind.
Speaker 7: Us being so not this crude matter. You must feel
Speaker 7: the force him between you, me, the three, the rock everywhere, yes,
Speaker 7: even between the land and the ship.
Speaker 5: You want the impossible.
Speaker 1: So this is the most I think like the force is.
Speaker 1: You know, we speak about ob one speaks about it
Speaker 1: in Star Wars. But in the Empire we start getting
Speaker 1: a lesson.
Speaker 5: Yeah yeah, in more of a lesson.
Speaker 2: And that feels like that's you know, that's being taken from.
Speaker 5: Philosopher a whole lot of things.
Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of things as well.
Speaker 5: It's very syncretic. But I think it's interesting because that
Speaker 5: bit you played is probably the most expensive Yoda ever get.
Speaker 5: I was surprised at how little of the training seemed
Speaker 5: to be embellished. It was kind of like Yoda sitting
Speaker 5: there saying use the force, to just use the force, Hey,
Speaker 5: use the force, Like there's not it doesn't have the
Speaker 5: same level of detail as wax on wax off, for example,
Speaker 5: or whatever you do, you know what I mean, Like
Speaker 5: where this takes place over a long time, and there's
Speaker 5: lots of instances of it, and you can see the
Speaker 5: development of his stage one, he's stage two. Suddenly he's
Speaker 5: making things levitate like it's yeah, it's all that sort
Speaker 5: of stuff. But the clip you played then is probably
Speaker 5: the only time you get a proper explanation. Apart from
Speaker 5: that is the only other thing might be when he says,
Speaker 5: I can't remember how the dialogue works. But the bottom
Speaker 5: line is you can't do this because you don't believe
Speaker 5: in it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and that.
Speaker 5: That's kind of the big obviously, that's a big moment,
Speaker 5: and we can see from here that what's going to
Speaker 5: happen is Look's going to come to believe in it and.
Speaker 2: I don't believe it and notices and that is why
Speaker 2: you fail.
Speaker 5: Yes that bit, yeah, yeah, So that bit and the
Speaker 5: bit you just played really the only time that flesh
Speaker 5: is put on the bones. I think that I can
Speaker 5: recall I might be missing something, but of like what
Speaker 5: the training actually involves, yes, which is another aspect of
Speaker 5: what I mean. Like, I feel like if this film
Speaker 5: were made today, or maybe it's that it's a kids film,
Speaker 5: maybe that's what it is, I don't know about anyway,
Speaker 5: that would be much more embellished. There'd be a much
Speaker 5: more detailed kind of possibly.
Speaker 1: But I think that the click we played, it's pretty
Speaker 1: I think, does a really good job of succinctly explaining
Speaker 1: what the force is. And I think, if you know,
Speaker 1: remembering it is a kids film, as you mentioned, if
Speaker 1: you had too much of that you can start losing
Speaker 1: some interest. So I think they do a really good
Speaker 1: job of putting it succinctly that we can understand, and
Speaker 1: there's still some mystery around it. We don't know if
Speaker 1: Luke can connect.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know with.
Speaker 5: This mystery is the key point there? I reckon, yes,
Speaker 5: because I think you want to have a sense of it,
Speaker 5: but you want your imagination to fill in the rest,
Speaker 5: especially if you're a kid.
Speaker 2: Yes, reckon.
Speaker 1: And what do you think of the Darth the cave
Speaker 1: as where he goes into the cave and he's confronted
Speaker 1: by by Darth Vader.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah yeah, the fake doth Yeah yeah, yeah. Okay,
Speaker 5: So because.
Speaker 1: When that happened, when I first saw still, when I
Speaker 1: first saying I didn't know it was I didn't know
Speaker 1: it was fake?
Speaker 2: Oh didn't you know? I just truly was like shit, right.
Speaker 5: Okay, So I never had that moment. I assumed this
Speaker 5: was either Yoda either somehow knowing this vision would occur
Speaker 5: or planting it somehow, or it was just within Luke.
Speaker 5: But the bit that so I never had that moment.
Speaker 5: But the bit where he cuts Darth Vader's head off
Speaker 5: and then suddenly Luke skywalks his own face looks back
Speaker 5: at him, I was I thought, oh, is this the
Speaker 5: foreshadowing of who Darth Vader actually is.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 5: The reason that's significant is I was completely blown, like
Speaker 5: taken by surprise later in the film where in spoiler
Speaker 5: of the Darth Vader reveals that he's Luke Skywalker's father,
Speaker 5: because although I knew that exists in the universe, I
Speaker 5: assumed that was a like end of Return of the
Speaker 5: Jedi moment that the whole trilogy fills up to this,
Speaker 5: and then it's like this dramatic revelation that happens right
Speaker 5: at the end of you go, oh my god, the
Speaker 5: whole thing makes sense now, well doesn't or whatever? Like
Speaker 5: this is ah, this changes everything where it's just sort
Speaker 5: of happened in the middle of the second thing. And
Speaker 5: I so when I was watching that Darth Vader interaction,
Speaker 5: the sort of fake one, I kind of thought, is
Speaker 5: that what they're telling us, should we have spotted this that,
Speaker 5: like we should know that in three years or whenever
Speaker 5: it is they released the next film, this is going
Speaker 5: to be revealed. And then now that it's actually revealed
Speaker 5: in that film, and I discovered that, to me, that's
Speaker 5: obviously what it's trying to say. I don't know if
Speaker 5: there's another interpretation of that no, I.
Speaker 2: Either related or there's there's something in him or this
Speaker 2: darkness in him.
Speaker 5: I guess that's that's what I was wondering if it
Speaker 5: was Maybe it was that is that you, you and
Speaker 5: darf Vada are not so dissimilar, which then marries with
Speaker 5: the warning that Ibi Wan and Yo to try to
Speaker 5: give him, saying don't don't go, you will be.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's and that's that's a big thing through the
Speaker 1: Star Wars films of like they know they have this
Speaker 1: star recruit, you know, and we cannot let this guy
Speaker 1: go to the dark side.
Speaker 2: Yes, And it's and it's in him. We know it's
Speaker 2: part of him. The force is strong and white, so strong,
Speaker 2: and we could not let him go to the other side.
Speaker 2: And it's a ways training is so important.
Speaker 5: Yes, although so Yoda says something cryptic in it in
Speaker 5: there where he says speaks, yeah, I know this is
Speaker 5: classic where he says either there will be another one
Speaker 5: or there is another one.
Speaker 1: Yes, Yoda says there is another. And it's a great
Speaker 1: shot it as it looks leaving, Yes, and the light
Speaker 1: kind of of the X thing I think kind of
Speaker 1: comes it's it's from a it's one of the more
Speaker 1: stunning Star Wars shots over the entire saga alone, that
Speaker 1: just this film. But he says, yeah, no, there is another.
Speaker 5: Yes, And I was like, who, what's the point of
Speaker 5: all this then? If you got another one up? Your sleep?
Speaker 5: So worried about this guy. So I don't know if
Speaker 5: this ever gets explained. I don't know if the turn
Speaker 5: of the Jedi is that where this turns up. It
Speaker 5: certainly doesn't feel explained yet, so I can only assume
Speaker 5: it's later, but that I just found a really cryptic
Speaker 5: sort of thing, and also the fact that Obi Wan
Speaker 5: clearly doesn't seem to think that or he didn't know that.
Speaker 5: But I do really love that particular scene because it's
Speaker 5: all really a meditation on the impetuousness of youth, and
Speaker 5: you know, he sort of is on the path again
Speaker 5: to becoming that tragic sort of figure who's going to
Speaker 5: commit the fatal mistake that he shouldn't but he's always
Speaker 5: going to commit it, you know, all that sort of thing,
Speaker 5: but then in the end he doesn't. So I'm trying
Speaker 5: to figure out whether Yoda's is Yoda wrong, did Yoda
Speaker 5: read this incorrectly or what? Or is Luke just that
Speaker 5: good but if Luke is that good, shouldn't Yoda have
Speaker 5: known that? And then I'm thinking he Yoda was skeptical
Speaker 5: about this whole character from the beginning. He didn't seem
Speaker 5: to think he was up to it. I'm beginning to
Speaker 5: think Yoda doesn't know what he's talking about.
Speaker 1: Yoda is on the side of going, well, we need,
Speaker 1: like I say, we need this guy for Philly's training
Speaker 1: because there's there's darkness, you know, loitering, so you need
Speaker 1: to finish your training. Luke's point is, yeah, but I
Speaker 1: got my best friends are in trouble. And the complexity
Speaker 1: is that, yeah, they're in trouble because Darth Vader, who
Speaker 1: Yoda probably knows is your father.
Speaker 2: Yeah he doesn't. He doesn't explain that to him. Here
Speaker 2: obviously this is a trap.
Speaker 5: Yes, don't fall into the trail.
Speaker 2: You are going headfirst into the trap.
Speaker 5: So whose side were you on when you listen to
Speaker 5: that Luke?
Speaker 2: You were?
Speaker 1: And Luke's still looks like yeah, because I'm like, of
Speaker 1: course he needs to go and rescue his friends. And
Speaker 1: that's what is That's what's say great about Star Wars.
Speaker 1: It often just comes down to these guys have each
Speaker 1: other's back Hahna. Early on in the film when and
Speaker 1: saved Luke even though he was he was leaving.
Speaker 2: You know, he doesn't believe.
Speaker 1: In all this bullshit, but he still went and saved
Speaker 1: lucas Luke needed him. Yeah, right, he's going to do
Speaker 1: and Luke knows that it just happened, so he's going
Speaker 1: to go save heart.
Speaker 5: Are you still on Luke's side?
Speaker 10: Ah?
Speaker 5: Yes, So I wonder if the reason I asked that
Speaker 5: is I wondered if it was a function of age.
Speaker 5: So if you're a kid, you're on Luke side because
Speaker 5: that's who you relate to. Yeah, whereas as you get older.
Speaker 5: And I watched this, obviously I'm not a kid. I'm
Speaker 5: totally on Yoda side. I'm like, look, what the hell
Speaker 5: are you doing? You're being raised for greater things here.
Speaker 5: And one of the things about achieving greatness or doing
Speaker 5: the great and important task is that there will be
Speaker 5: pain along the way that you will just have to bear.
Speaker 5: That is your burden. And if that means your friends suffer,
Speaker 5: then it is the lesser thing to worry about that
Speaker 5: then than it is to worry about the bigger picture
Speaker 5: that Yoda is calling you to. He's sort of calling
Speaker 5: you to the you know, the greater battle, the like
Speaker 5: the greater task, and you're proving right now that you're
Speaker 5: not up to that task. And so I was like,
Speaker 5: this is this is nuts. You've got to listen to
Speaker 5: this guy.
Speaker 2: I think we're seeing why I haven't won the Gold
Speaker 2: LOGI you have, but you are you are just Oh no,
Speaker 2: I'm besst for bigger things. I'm saying it I'm doing
Speaker 2: to work while I'm out there saving friends.
Speaker 7: Now.
Speaker 2: Well, but I think, as I watched it as an adult,
Speaker 2: I'm saying, from a movie perspective, of course he needs
Speaker 2: to go in and put himself in harm's way, in danger.
Speaker 5: He stays with Yoda. It's boring.
Speaker 2: It's boring film well, even though I do imagine it
Speaker 2: being like from a story point of view, the idea
Speaker 2: of him staying and it's only interesting if if harden
Speaker 2: Hahn does die.
Speaker 5: Yeah, in a way, which they said they don't know.
Speaker 5: So that's the other thing is he can't be sure
Speaker 5: you won't die. But I'm sitting there thinking, yeah, but
Speaker 5: what if you save Hahn? But everyone dies in the
Speaker 5: end because the empire, whose motivations are still unclear by
Speaker 5: the way.
Speaker 1: It has been one of the big one of the
Speaker 1: great revelations in this podcast. You brought us with many
Speaker 1: people afterwards that what did the Empire.
Speaker 5: Actually, I still don't know the politics of all them.
Speaker 2: It backs up the whole thing that is it's good
Speaker 2: versus bad.
Speaker 5: They don't need to know. Yeah, but yeah, if ultimately
Speaker 5: you lose to the Empire, then that's that's a disastrous thing.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean does darve Vader, you know, does he
Speaker 1: have his own plans? You know, maybe he's gonna put
Speaker 1: some theme parks in, you know, like maybe maybe it's
Speaker 1: not going to be as bad.
Speaker 2: They're going to rule the galaxy together. Well, I'll listen
Speaker 2: to your ideas, Luke.
Speaker 5: Yes, that's what he's invited to.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5: The other question I have is, and this is the
Speaker 5: question Lucas, is why didn't they tell him that Darfod
Speaker 5: is his father?
Speaker 1: Well, I suspect it was the fear of them going, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: maybe I should hang out with him if his.
Speaker 5: Dad, Oh you think he'll be attracted. Well, well, that's
Speaker 5: what they're worried about.
Speaker 1: I think that's what they're worried about, right, because again,
Speaker 1: it's this constant fear that Darkside will will win the
Speaker 1: battle for luc Soul if you like.
Speaker 5: Yes, okay, okay, again, that's.
Speaker 1: A big theme throughout Star Wars even ongoing, right is
Speaker 1: the battle within of course?
Speaker 5: Yes, I think can I just say something on that.
Speaker 5: I think that's why this really works. And I think
Speaker 5: that's what makes Star Wars a better version of this
Speaker 5: sort of kid's superhero thing than most other versions of it.
Speaker 5: It's that it does have that kind of thematic depth.
Speaker 5: It's not just about here's this guy who's really all
Speaker 5: that stuff and he's going to go and take on
Speaker 5: the bad guys. That thirst is quenched by just the
Speaker 5: action whatever, But it's so much it's actually much richer
Speaker 5: than that that, you know, And that's why I think
Speaker 5: why the Yoda sort of drawing on all of that
Speaker 5: sort of spiritual language, and he's a spiritual guide really,
Speaker 5: even more so I think than being like a military
Speaker 5: or a martial arts type guide. I think that's why
Speaker 5: he's such a crucial and I think much loved character,
Speaker 5: because he injects the whole thing with a sort of
Speaker 5: moral depth that you just don't get elsewhere. And I
Speaker 5: don't know if that's a thing everybody's noticed and spoken
Speaker 5: about or whatever. But I think that's the bit for
Speaker 5: me that makes it watchable as an adult that I
Speaker 5: think I wouldn't say for probably a whole lot of
Speaker 5: I I don't really care to watch Spider Man because
Speaker 5: it's got with great power comes great responsibility. But that's it, Like,
Speaker 5: there's not really much more. That's why I love Batman
Speaker 5: so much more than other superheroes, because there's so much
Speaker 5: depth and complexity, and there's conundrums, and there's psychology and
Speaker 5: there's moral philosophy, and there's all these things that come
Speaker 5: together to make the moments, and I feel like that's. Yeah.
Speaker 5: I hadn't thought about it as the battle within, but
Speaker 5: that's a really key thing. Without that, there's no Star Wars.
Speaker 1: Let's play one more grab from Yoda as he warns
Speaker 1: Luke about what might be ahead before we leave the
Speaker 1: Dago bar system.
Speaker 5: I'm not afraid.
Speaker 7: You will be. You will be.
Speaker 2: I mean, I do love that. I mean chills.
Speaker 1: It's so good and that I really do get chills
Speaker 1: every time I watch that. That's great writing, and it's
Speaker 1: also great voice work from Franks, great puppeteering, and it
Speaker 1: is awesome.
Speaker 5: I still don't know what that's referring to. Has he
Speaker 5: been scared yet?
Speaker 7: Well?
Speaker 1: No, I think I think what looks what Yodas are
Speaker 1: saying to him is this journey you're about to embark on,
Speaker 1: and this is before him though he's not going off
Speaker 1: to save Hard at this stage, I don't think. But
Speaker 1: this is like, there will be a confrontation where you
Speaker 1: have to come up against Darth Vader at some point,
Speaker 1: and you need This is why this training is important. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you need to do this because But is.
Speaker 5: He referring to the confrontation that happens in this film
Speaker 5: or is there something bigger coming that I suspect.
Speaker 1: I suspect there's something bigger right coming, whether it's a
Speaker 1: confrontation with Darth Vader at the end of this film
Speaker 1: that he you know, I mean, looks about the throw
Speaker 1: that spanner into works by kind of leaving. So does
Speaker 1: Yoda know that that, you know? Does he had to
Speaker 1: adjust his visions as a result. I'm not sure, but
Speaker 1: I yeah, I love that, and I love you know,
Speaker 1: I love him getting the X Wing out of the
Speaker 1: swamp like a massive moment in Style Wars.
Speaker 5: Oh, is it right?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Well, just as a just because it's a great scene.
Speaker 1: It does kind of you know, down the track we
Speaker 1: were is another it's a call back to it at
Speaker 1: some point.
Speaker 5: So what's funny about that moment was when he tried
Speaker 5: to do it, Louke tried to bring it out but
Speaker 5: he couldn't and whatever, and Yoda's like a bit disappointed
Speaker 5: and Luke wand is off in a half. My first
Speaker 5: thought was, I, forgot's sake, just lift it up and
Speaker 5: show him.
Speaker 2: Ah, oh we did it.
Speaker 5: Okay, great, there it is. It was great in my mind.
Speaker 5: It was a lot less dramatic, but.
Speaker 2: Very not sure dagabout is droid friendly as well.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure, if you know, Yoda might have to
Speaker 1: make some adjustments around more droids over I'm the how
Speaker 1: to got around?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: How did I to survive? When he was submerged in that?
Speaker 8: I thought?
Speaker 1: Shot in George Blukes's pool. That scene apparently he's serious. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: just just that that. There's I think the scene where
Speaker 1: he gets thrown out of the that's amazing.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's weird looking.
Speaker 1: He's got to clean it. Come on, George, let's get
Speaker 1: the Cloud City. I love Cloud City. I thought it
Speaker 1: was just a different aesthetic for Star Wars. You know,
Speaker 1: the guards, the Royal guards that were there in the
Speaker 1: Red We met Lando, Billy d Williams. He auditioned for
Speaker 1: Han solo in the original trilogy. George Lucas was was
Speaker 1: he got he got close, and I'm not sure it's
Speaker 1: because Harrison Ford was, you know, quite the up and comer.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure, but George had said he was keen
Speaker 1: to have a black man play Hann solo. So it's
Speaker 1: interesting to look at back then, even though there was
Speaker 1: a desire that maybe have it well and I haven't.
Speaker 1: I don't know how the conversations, but I wonder what
Speaker 1: it was. Was it it's stopped, studio pressure or just
Speaker 1: the fear of going He's just gonna Yeah, it's just
Speaker 1: too much, you know. Even back in nineteen eighty, even
Speaker 1: when John Boega was cast as Finn in the recent
Speaker 1: was there was a backlash against it.
Speaker 5: So I wonder if that's a backlash that's more now
Speaker 5: than it would have been then.
Speaker 1: Though possibly, Yeah, absolutely, so I haven't heard it spoken
Speaker 1: about whether you know it was just that Harrison Ford
Speaker 1: got the role because you know, he was a better
Speaker 1: fair and it's hard to argue that Harrison Ford isn't
Speaker 1: the brilliant in the role.
Speaker 5: No, no, is there a lot of commentary among Stuwells
Speaker 5: fans about or even non fans about Oh okay, so
Speaker 5: they have a black character and then he turns out
Speaker 5: to be the bad guy.
Speaker 1: I almost did a bit about that, But I did
Speaker 1: do a bit. I didn't quite go to work good
Speaker 1: enough to going to keep doing it. But the idea
Speaker 1: that there's one black man, black character and he's the
Speaker 1: one who portrayed.
Speaker 2: It's not comes good at the end.
Speaker 1: Yeah, really still, Yeah, he does come good, and I
Speaker 1: think that's important because you do love people love Lando.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I quite liked him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and there were and.
Speaker 5: I will say I felt sorry for him even with
Speaker 5: the betrayal, which I loved. By the way, that might
Speaker 5: have actually been my favorite moment in film. Yes, because
Speaker 5: I didn't see it coming at all. I don't know
Speaker 5: if I should have or not. No, I didn't. I
Speaker 5: didn't get foot at all by the Darth Vader vision bit,
Speaker 5: but that bit completely got me.
Speaker 9: Yeah.
Speaker 5: And but even when he says they got here before
Speaker 5: you did, I had no choice because you get this
Speaker 5: sense of an empire that will just do absolutely anything
Speaker 5: to anyone. I kind of didn't blame him. I don't
Speaker 5: know if you meant to or not. Maybe you are,
Speaker 5: but I felt like the alternative is he just gets
Speaker 5: killed and they do this anyway, Like I sort of
Speaker 5: I had a level of sympathy for his predicament.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, which, Yeah, it was a trap not just
Speaker 1: for Hahn, but as a trap Lando fell.
Speaker 2: Into as well. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I love that that scene, like and I absolutely remember
Speaker 1: being as shocked. I think they it's so well executed.
Speaker 1: Often wonder what he was going to be serving at
Speaker 1: a that dinner party.
Speaker 5: Yeah, since an excellent question I did.
Speaker 1: When I did, I was lucky enough to do the
Speaker 1: Rise of Skywalker junket in California, and and I would.
Speaker 1: I interviewed all of them and except who didn't I
Speaker 1: get to Well, Mark Hammer wasn't there, Harrison Ford wasn't there,
Speaker 1: Kerry Fisher sadly obviously wasn't there. But Anthony Daniels, Billy
Speaker 1: d Williams or a new giant Biega as Oscar Isaac,
Speaker 1: and I asked them, I'll go and ask him what
Speaker 1: was I said, this is I want to ask a
Speaker 1: question you haven't and asked for what was Darthway to
Speaker 1: going to be serving strikes Back? And I stopped asking
Speaker 1: because I think I think ask Isaacs and Kerry Russell,
Speaker 1: and they they had fin aanswers. But then I remember
Speaker 1: I got to somebody who I thought was going to
Speaker 1: have a really finn answer was Richard E.
Speaker 2: Grant. I interviewed him who's in that film?
Speaker 1: And he just kind of like like had a bit
Speaker 1: of a laugh and then this went, ah, I don't know,
Speaker 1: it was polite.
Speaker 5: It was polite, but it's like the Fate of the Junket.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well you do.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you can go these questions you're not sure if
Speaker 1: they're going to be fun or not fun, and they
Speaker 1: can really Yeah, okay, I could probably.
Speaker 5: Take do you know it's funny you say that, though,
Speaker 5: because I think a lot. I've thought a lot watching
Speaker 5: these films about the food, because the food's never really
Speaker 5: expect I don't know what these guys eat, no, because
Speaker 5: the animals are all completely different, So yeah, are they?
Speaker 1: Well, there's blue milk, which is a bit of a
Speaker 1: running kind of not a gag, I guess, but you
Speaker 1: often see must be seen and then post strikes Back,
Speaker 1: you certainly see it in the original Star Wars, but yes,
Speaker 1: it's but that scene and I remember having the cards
Speaker 1: collect the cars came out, and I particularly love getting
Speaker 1: the cards that are based around these things in Cloud City.
Speaker 5: There's something about the look of Cloud City that I
Speaker 5: really it's it's very clean for modern and it feels
Speaker 5: to me like it performs a similar function as some
Speaker 5: of the outposts that you encounter in Game of Thrones. Yeah,
Speaker 5: kind of like I don't know, like carth or something
Speaker 5: like that. It is marine another one. I don't know.
Speaker 5: I can't remember all the names of the different but
Speaker 5: it sort of has that feeling about it. I don't
Speaker 5: know what it is. It's maybe it's because it's removed
Speaker 5: from the main battle scene.
Speaker 2: I think it took a while for me to realize.
Speaker 1: I think Cloud City helped watching it really understand the
Speaker 1: Star Wars universe. They don't do as good a job
Speaker 1: as like Game of Thrones to have explaining that there
Speaker 1: are different houses and worlds, but not worlds, but they
Speaker 1: were it's all part of the same world, but different
Speaker 1: counties or lands or whatever, and these you know, I
Speaker 1: think when you go to Cloud City, it's like, oh, Okay,
Speaker 1: so this is this is.
Speaker 2: Not necessarily a land that's at war.
Speaker 5: This is just, you know, like a hidden nook somewhere
Speaker 5: that's sort of on the sidelines of the conflict.
Speaker 2: And they've all got their own little style and ecosystem
Speaker 2: even And.
Speaker 5: I feel like it's in that moment, in fact, in
Speaker 5: that room when the doors open and you see Darth Vada,
Speaker 5: that I think his outfit, his costume, looks at its best.
Speaker 5: I don't know what it is, but there's something about it,
Speaker 5: because you know, the helmet is so impossibly shiny and everything,
Speaker 5: and the black is really black and all that. Maybe
Speaker 5: it's because it's juxtaposed against this much sort of shinier
Speaker 5: white background or whatever. Yeah, but I don't know, I
Speaker 5: don't know. I can't explain it. But as soon as
Speaker 5: I saw it, I just thought, yes, this is the
Speaker 5: ultimate sort of image, the ultimate vision of Darth Vader
Speaker 5: as the bad guy in control, lauding it over these people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it was.
Speaker 8: It was.
Speaker 5: It's a remarkable Again. Again, it comes back to aesthetic,
Speaker 5: I guess, and it's a remarkable aesthetic that moment.
Speaker 2: I love it so much.
Speaker 1: And we'll move to the he gets caught the Carbon Freeze.
Speaker 1: I thought, these these things, it's extraordinary.
Speaker 5: I thought, yeah, yeah, they are great. And the tension
Speaker 5: in them as.
Speaker 1: Well, Yeah, there's genuine tension, there's genuine emotion. You are
Speaker 1: you're not sure what is going to have. You know,
Speaker 1: Luke is not far away? Is he going to get
Speaker 1: there in time?
Speaker 10: You?
Speaker 1: I think probably the first time you watch it, you
Speaker 1: assume that he might get there. And famously, Harrison Ford
Speaker 1: was not. We did not want to come back this.
Speaker 1: He wanted this to be the last film he did.
Speaker 1: This Doar was film, so he asked George Lucas to
Speaker 1: kill him off, said that he didn't want to do that,
Speaker 1: and he was hoping he could change his mind between
Speaker 1: the two films.
Speaker 2: So he came with the Carbon Freeze.
Speaker 1: That so has an idea, Yeah, and it's it's it's
Speaker 1: happy accidents. You love I love hearing about happy accidents
Speaker 1: in movies. And the scene where Leah says I love you.
Speaker 1: Harm was supposed to say in the script, remember that
Speaker 1: because I'll be back and he's journal Destruction film and
Speaker 1: he knew. He goes, well, I don't know if I
Speaker 1: want to come back. So it's been it's been said
Speaker 1: that it was an ad lib when he said, I know,
Speaker 1: which is such a great line.
Speaker 5: It perfectly fits the whole so characterization.
Speaker 2: But it wasn't necessarily.
Speaker 1: It wasn't necessarily a ad lib as such. He had
Speaker 1: a conversation with the director about about this line and
Speaker 1: they came up with that, so it was, you know,
Speaker 1: it was a discussion, you know, so less of an
Speaker 1: ad lib and then more of a rewrite.
Speaker 5: I guess, yeah, right. I think because I for some
Speaker 5: reason assumed hum would be in Return of the Jedi, which,
Speaker 5: of course if you're watching this first time, you would
Speaker 5: never have known, because you don't know Return of jedis.
Speaker 5: But I think I just always assumed he would survive it.
Speaker 5: But even then I'd managed to suspend my disbelief enough
Speaker 5: to believe that he might die. So that sense that
Speaker 5: he's been put in this thing more or less for
Speaker 5: experimental reasons to determine whether or not they can do
Speaker 5: it to Luke, and that it might all end up
Speaker 5: in this whole tragic nightmare where Luke a ignores Yoda
Speaker 5: and Obi Wan's advice and falls into the trap and
Speaker 5: Hans while they dies. Anyway, was just too much to
Speaker 5: take like that he it could fail on multiple grounds.
Speaker 5: And so at this point the writing scenes on the wall,
Speaker 5: Hahn's going to die and Luke, so Luke's not going
Speaker 5: to save him, and then he's going to fall into
Speaker 5: this trap and go over the dark side. And the
Speaker 5: only reason not to believe that is that this film
Speaker 5: has to have a happy ending at some point. Well,
Speaker 5: the whole series has to have happen. It's the only
Speaker 5: reason that you wouldn't think that that's exactly what's going
Speaker 5: to happen there.
Speaker 1: What I also love about this these scenes are the sound.
Speaker 1: The sound design is as all three the Star Wars
Speaker 1: film is incredible. This film's it forms such a massive
Speaker 1: part of it. We've got the Vader breathing and everything.
Speaker 1: Let's have a lesson of some of these some of
Speaker 1: the carbon freeze scene.
Speaker 6: What's going on?
Speaker 2: But you're being put at the carbon freeze?
Speaker 7: What if he doesn't survive? He works a lot.
Speaker 6: To me, the umpire will compensate you if he dies.
Speaker 10: Please, I'm not ready to die.
Speaker 2: Listen to me, cheweye me, hey, save your strength.
Speaker 7: There'll be another time.
Speaker 2: The princess, you have to take care of her.
Speaker 7: You hear me? Huh m.
Speaker 4: Hm, I love you.
Speaker 7: I know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm in the school. Everything about that Chewy Chewie
Speaker 1: does inject so much emotion into that. He's your reaction,
Speaker 1: so I god Han saying take care of lay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's all It's all happening here.
Speaker 5: Is kind of pure emotion, isn't he yes, because there's
Speaker 5: no words instead of it's all they can be.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Boba Fett was played by Jeremy Bollock in it, well,
Speaker 2: at least voiced apparently the Ten Minutes Work voiced it,
Speaker 2: but then the post prequels revoiced him with Tamiro Morrison,
Speaker 2: the New Zealand actor, because he plays Boba Fett in
Speaker 2: the in the earlier prequels, So right, so yeah, But
Speaker 2: apparently Jeremy Bullock has been ripped off apparently with being
Speaker 2: paid and various things. So there you go, let's just
Speaker 2: move the front of them. Yeah, Jeremy Bullock show.
Speaker 8: I like it.
Speaker 5: Can I say about the score. One of the things
Speaker 5: I did have this thought actually as I was watching it,
Speaker 5: is there is something magnificent about a movie that is
Speaker 5: entirely scored originally with an orchestra.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, which I don't know if that's.
Speaker 5: Become less or more common in film. When I think
Speaker 5: of film soundtracks now, I tend to think of them
Speaker 5: using songs or getting songs written.
Speaker 1: I still think there's a lot of composing going on.
Speaker 1: It depends what you if it's if it's there are
Speaker 1: still a lot of movies who use yeah, a lot,
Speaker 1: a lot of soundtracks, you know, yeah, particularly if they're
Speaker 1: aimed at the younger audience perhaps, you know, but or.
Speaker 5: The tone of the film is that, Yeah, there's.
Speaker 2: Still films like We're did in Brews recently.
Speaker 1: Carter Burwell is one of the great composed of the
Speaker 1: recent composers of recent times. You know, films your current
Speaker 1: brothers will get you used to a certain composer. Often
Speaker 1: in this Carter Burwell, where's Anderson?
Speaker 5: You know, the same han Zimmer always turns up and
Speaker 5: cranks it to eleven.
Speaker 1: With Well, if you're after one of those, you know
Speaker 1: kind of yeah, whether it's an epic or hahn Zimer
Speaker 1: is often your guy. But there's still certainly, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: probably more now than there was where they will use
Speaker 1: soundtrack modern score.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's almost like it gives you an immediate there's
Speaker 5: an instant gratification. I think to that, whereas a score
Speaker 5: you either don't notice or when you do, it takes
Speaker 5: time to dawn upon you that, oh this is actually
Speaker 5: quite well scored. But how good is he?
Speaker 2: Like it?
Speaker 5: Just because he's John Williamson is like the He's the
Speaker 5: composer of my childhood. Really when you think about that,
Speaker 5: he did the Superman stuff.
Speaker 2: And Superman Johns and Jones.
Speaker 5: Yeah, the Olympic theme it was for whatever Olympics that was,
Speaker 5: was Los Angeles whatever. Anyway, Yeah, he just I don't
Speaker 5: know if I'm just being nostalgic saying he's the best,
Speaker 5: like he's my father.
Speaker 1: I think I brought up last time, like I wonder.
Speaker 1: I wonder where he does sit with the great composers
Speaker 1: of history, you know. And I think you said somebody
Speaker 1: said to you once, don't co bear anyone debate. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's just out of a conversation. He lives in his
Speaker 1: own world. But yeah, you'd wonder, like you know, in
Speaker 1: thee hundred years time or I or if John Williamson
Speaker 1: existed a hundred years ago, we would and then did
Speaker 1: these pieces of music.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we will be.
Speaker 2: Holding them up against I'm sure some of the great composers.
Speaker 5: Yeah, because I think the bits to me are especially
Speaker 5: the stuff that a company is the Empire. Yeah, Like
Speaker 5: I suppose you're a bit familiar with them, so maybe
Speaker 5: that helps so they become you receive them a bit
Speaker 5: more like you receive a song because you kin'd of.
Speaker 5: I don't know, but if I had to imagine what
Speaker 5: the Empire sounds like in orchestral form, this is it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: It's just so perfectly done. Yeah, and I think he's
Speaker 5: just at his best in those sort of moments. And
Speaker 5: that's before you get to the main theme and like
Speaker 5: all that that sort of stuff. It's those little bits,
Speaker 5: like I think, I feel like the character of Darth
Speaker 5: Vader owes a lot to a lot of people. M
Speaker 5: and John Williamson is one of those people.
Speaker 1: Did you like his sorry when you mentioned Dart, did
Speaker 1: you like his little meditation cave?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I don't think you ever see that again in.
Speaker 5: Star Wars and so and the shot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, up.
Speaker 1: Until this point, certainly you only see Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I remember seeing that for the first time, thinking I
Speaker 1: have to be reminded that there was a human and
Speaker 1: he wasn't.
Speaker 2: I think for a long time I just thought he
Speaker 2: was robot.
Speaker 5: Oh that's interesting. So yeah, so do we ever see
Speaker 5: any more of that?
Speaker 2: You probably shouldn't tell me, no, but I don't. I
Speaker 2: don't think we do.
Speaker 5: What's interesting about that is the reaction of whoever it was.
Speaker 5: It's almost like for him the magic is gone in
Speaker 5: that moment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks like he's seen something you shouldn't see,
Speaker 1: whether you know he'd be in trouble for seeing it,
Speaker 1: or he just felt like seeing your mum in a nude.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, okay, I hadn't thought of it that way.
Speaker 5: I thought of it more that it diminished him somehow,
Speaker 5: diminished data somehow. It's like, ah, he just this guy
Speaker 5: with this horrible disfigurement of some sort that we don't
Speaker 5: really get to see, but which brings you back to
Speaker 5: the costume, right, because the costume is part out of
Speaker 5: the majesty of this this figure. Yeah, he's the Wizard
Speaker 5: of Oz. Yeah, you know, you take away the facade,
Speaker 5: suddenly it's a lot less threatening, except that he has
Speaker 5: the use of the force. By the way, it would
Speaker 5: seem a lot more efficient if Darth Vader didn't just
Speaker 5: kill everybody who made a mistake.
Speaker 2: Why does he do that well because his people skills
Speaker 2: aren't great. Okay, he's management.
Speaker 1: He's got his own management style, Okay, and part of
Speaker 1: that is not any kind of you know.
Speaker 5: He said, right, Okay, I just wonder if you can
Speaker 5: get away with a lot more back in ninety one.
Speaker 2: Sure, if you're in charge.
Speaker 5: I don't understand imperial industrial relations clearly, but I just
Speaker 5: feel like you're Can you lose a lot of experience
Speaker 5: pretty quickly by doing that?
Speaker 9: Do you?
Speaker 2: Yes? Oh? Yes, yeah, yeah. He has to retrain a
Speaker 2: lot of people.
Speaker 5: He would have to. I don't know who's applaying.
Speaker 1: Let's get to the final moments with the big revelation.
Speaker 1: Let's have it a little bit of a Listen to
Speaker 1: one of the biggest revelations in movie history.
Speaker 6: There is no escape. Don't make me destroy you, Fluke.
Speaker 6: You do not yet realign your importance. We have only
Speaker 6: begun to discover your power. Join me and I will
Speaker 6: complete your training. With our combined strength, we can end
Speaker 6: this destructive conflict and bring order to the galaxy.
Speaker 7: I'll never join you.
Speaker 6: If you only knew the power of a dark side
Speaker 6: or be one never told you what happened to your.
Speaker 9: Father meets only enough.
Speaker 7: Hats on me who killed it?
Speaker 9: No, I am your Father's not true.
Speaker 6: That siritual feelings.
Speaker 5: You know it to be true.
Speaker 6: Luke, you can destroy the Emperor. He has foreseen this.
Speaker 6: It is your destiny. Join me and together we can rule.
Speaker 6: The galaxy is farther in the sun.
Speaker 7: Come with me.
Speaker 9: It is the only way.
Speaker 2: No, there's another way falls into the abyss Man.
Speaker 5: You're really undercut that there, so you.
Speaker 2: You didn't see this coming in this movie.
Speaker 7: No.
Speaker 5: I was even right up to the moment when he
Speaker 5: said it.
Speaker 2: Because I assumed, Okay, the one thing you will know
Speaker 2: about this film is that this is what you might
Speaker 2: not A Yoda appears and that.
Speaker 5: No, actually even the Oda thing. I kind of forgot
Speaker 5: about Yoda, right and then he appeared. I was like, Yoda,
Speaker 5: this is great, and there was like, oh not Yoda.
Speaker 2: That it's like, oh Yoda.
Speaker 5: But I obviously I knew that revelation happens, which is
Speaker 5: really unfortunate that, you know. I I'm not saying people
Speaker 5: shouldn't have spoiled it by now. I'm just saying it's
Speaker 5: on for it because it would. I'm trying to imagine
Speaker 5: what it must have been like to hear those words,
Speaker 5: and it must have been.
Speaker 2: Seismic melted my brain.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's no I mean, I'm like I said, I
Speaker 1: don't think I saw it at the cinema, but I
Speaker 1: certainly remember watching it on VHS at home. And this
Speaker 1: is pre internet, so the only way you know is
Speaker 1: if somebody spoiled it for you.
Speaker 2: Nobody had done that, and I was, yeah, this was wow.
Speaker 5: It must have been the only thing kids were talking
Speaker 5: about at school because it's it changes everything. It just
Speaker 5: it cast everything you've seen in a new light, and
Speaker 5: it makes everything that happens henceforth different. So it's just
Speaker 5: But even up to the moment when he said I
Speaker 5: am your father, like the millisecond before he says that,
Speaker 5: I still didn't expect him to say it. I thought, oh, wow,
Speaker 5: this is an amazing setup to a revelation that's going
Speaker 5: to happen in the next film. They're taking you right
Speaker 5: to the brink and then they're going to pull you
Speaker 5: back without revealing it. And then he went and said it,
Speaker 5: and I was like, oh, oh, well happened quickly, which
Speaker 5: when I listened back to it, and it didn't happen
Speaker 5: quickly really at all. It's quite change. But I just
Speaker 5: wasn't expecting that. And yeah, it's it's an amazing I mean,
Speaker 5: you know, his hands cut off. I think by this
Speaker 5: point as well.
Speaker 2: It becomes a big thing. Yeah, the lights, the light saber.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, so's he's not in the best position.
Speaker 2: At this point. The Empire has successfully struck, yes.
Speaker 5: It has, and but I will say at the end
Speaker 5: of it, what you're left with is, Okay, so the
Speaker 5: Emperor has foreseen that Luke would join Darth Vader. He's
Speaker 5: got that wrong. Yoda and Obi Wan have foreseen that
Speaker 5: he would join dath Vader, and they've got that wrong.
Speaker 5: There's not a lot of great forecasting going on. It's
Speaker 5: a bad week with tips, Tipster's nightmare.
Speaker 2: Well, and you know, I.
Speaker 1: Think what that says is that Luke's this is a
Speaker 1: special case.
Speaker 2: Luke Gowok is a special case. It's complicated, and he
Speaker 2: still has agency.
Speaker 1: There's a battle for the soul of Lusk going on,
Speaker 1: which I think is really great. But I do like that,
Speaker 1: you know, they end up together, you know, they rescue
Speaker 1: go back and they rescue Luke. I mean, there was
Speaker 1: a little clue in there in that last little scene
Speaker 1: that yeah, well, why do they go back?
Speaker 5: As in, why does Lao go back? Well, I just
Speaker 5: assume because they need Luke and they all go back
Speaker 5: to rescue each other.
Speaker 2: Is this something? How did they know that Luke was there?
Speaker 5: Because she at the time it made total sense. Why
Speaker 5: did she know that? She just felt it, didn't she
Speaker 5: she felt it? So you're saying it's the force.
Speaker 2: There is another Oh there's another force?
Speaker 5: Whither are you're joking? I really wish we hadn't had
Speaker 5: this conversation.
Speaker 2: You should have worked that out.
Speaker 5: I know I was too busy thinking about Yeah, but
Speaker 5: what exactly is the politics of the empire when I
Speaker 5: was missing the whole the main game?
Speaker 2: Yes, and she felt it we need to turn back?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 5: But was she Is she the only one to have
Speaker 5: sensed well sort of thing. Arguably Hahn had that kind
Speaker 5: of thing with Luke.
Speaker 1: Uh No, Hahn was told that Luke's Luke's out there?
Speaker 1: Is he's you know, he's in these help?
Speaker 5: No, you're right, I've completely misread.
Speaker 2: There are more. There are twists in terms in regards
Speaker 2: to that we return one day with after watching the
Speaker 2: Return of.
Speaker 5: The Time Blood, I've also got to come up with
Speaker 5: three more films that I like.
Speaker 2: Well, wait, do you end up doing the Rise of
Speaker 2: sky work nine films in great and then there's a
Speaker 2: spin offs.
Speaker 5: We have to make a philosophical decision about how I
Speaker 5: feel about all that.
Speaker 2: Yes, we'll discuss that at the end of the next
Speaker 2: So the.
Speaker 1: A couple of fun facts. We've already covered a lot
Speaker 1: of it, but he's a fun one. Darth Vader tripped
Speaker 1: on the cable when he entered the hot thing and
Speaker 1: face planted, which I assume they've got on camera, and
Speaker 1: they should put that out as soon as possible because
Speaker 1: that is that is awesome. If you're a German or
Speaker 1: a Dutch person watching Star Wars, you may have seen
Speaker 1: the twist coming earlier than others because Darth is a
Speaker 1: very on dark but Vader means father in Dutch or German,
Speaker 1: so they probably would have been straight away.
Speaker 5: They would have just assumed its dark lord right like
Speaker 5: father as in.
Speaker 2: There possibly.
Speaker 1: If your Germinal Dutch, let us know if you if
Speaker 1: you worked it out before the rest of us did.
Speaker 1: In Italy, the name was changed from Darth Vader to
Speaker 1: Lord Feena because Vader sounds like toilet.
Speaker 5: Italian we can tell you weren't in charge of that
Speaker 5: kept that no doubt.
Speaker 1: Carroen Fishers stood on a box when she did Seno
Speaker 1: Harrison Ford because she's five to one. Harrison Fall was
Speaker 1: six six foot. Jim Henson was originally offered the roll
Speaker 1: as Yoda.
Speaker 5: But I assumed he had something to do with it.
Speaker 1: He possibly did, and I assume that the creation of
Speaker 1: the puppet probably was cantin Jim Henson, but he was
Speaker 1: doing the Great Muppet Caper at the time.
Speaker 5: He's one of my favorite. Why did not mentioned that.
Speaker 2: Well, that's there's one put in your park?
Speaker 5: Can you remind me of that?
Speaker 2: Put it in?
Speaker 5: Because I have watched that film more than I watched
Speaker 5: any other film in the world. Wow, Because every time
Speaker 5: I got sick when I was a kid start from school.
Speaker 2: I watched it. It was the mid day show and
Speaker 2: days of our life.
Speaker 5: All that.
Speaker 2: So then Jim Henson suggested Frank Oz and history the rest.
Speaker 5: Is history suggestion.
Speaker 1: We also there's a there's a fun fact that Harrison
Speaker 1: Ford and Carrie Fisher hung out with Eric Idle and
Speaker 1: the Rolling Stones in his book. We interviewed Eric Idle
Speaker 1: and he kind of spoke about this and like that
Speaker 1: there's one. There's a scene where they are hungover in Stars.
Speaker 1: I forget what's the end of these. I think it's
Speaker 1: maybe when they arrive at Cloud City or something like that,
Speaker 1: where they're a little bit hangover. You can't really tell,
Speaker 1: to be honest, if you're looking for it, you might
Speaker 1: be able to glean something out of it. But otherwise, yes,
Speaker 1: it would have been a fun night to be had
Speaker 1: with the Mighty Python crew to Rolling Stones in the
Speaker 1: Star Wars game that I would have I could have
Speaker 1: died that night.
Speaker 5: And yeah, that's like your trifector. Yeah, that's that's pretty
Speaker 5: Maybe if there was a cold.
Speaker 1: Buckley and Peter Dekos had been there, Wow, that would
Speaker 1: have been it.
Speaker 2: Mate.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Huge episode. That's well have our
Speaker 1: longest but all worth it. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: doing the homework. And we'll see you that's the next series. Yes,
Speaker 1: I'll give you some time to recover the process Empire
Speaker 1: Strikes Back, but you'll be back for Return of the Jedi.
Speaker 7: You must feel the force around you, between you, between
Speaker 7: the world, everywhere, yes, even between.
Speaker 1: Well that was an epic, not just discussing Empire Strikes Back,
Speaker 1: but also while it's other films. I love getting his
Speaker 1: take on the Castle. I mean that film, this keeps
Speaker 1: on coming back up, and it was again a very
Speaker 1: interesting take on that one from Wilaid and also the
Speaker 1: Malcolm X discussion. Thank you for Wally for coming in
Speaker 1: once again and doing his homework and watching Empire Strikes Back.
Speaker 1: He just watched it this morning, so it was a
Speaker 1: really fresh take from Walid about one of my favorite films.
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed the fact when I when I sat
Speaker 1: down to watch it again for the first time in
Speaker 1: in quite a while, that I that I loved it
Speaker 1: as much as I remembered. It is my favorite Star
Speaker 1: Wars film. It maintained that Mantle Derek Mayer is joined
Speaker 1: us from Cassway Studios. Do you want to get your
Speaker 1: podcasts going, Come and chat with Derek or get in
Speaker 1: touch with him at Caswaystudios dot com dot au. We
Speaker 1: are in Collingwood in Victoria, a stone's throw a drop
Speaker 1: punt away from Smith Street, recently named by Time Out
Speaker 1: magazine as the coolest street in the world. That's where
Speaker 1: we're recording. Coming to hang out here and get your
Speaker 1: podcast going with Derek.
Speaker 2: Make how a Derek fantastic did you know that Smith
Speaker 2: Street was the cooler street in the world.
Speaker 8: I've been saying that for twenty five years.
Speaker 1: You have, you have been a long time resident. It
Speaker 1: has come a long way in those twenty five years.
Speaker 1: It has to be said.
Speaker 8: It might not have really been cool maybe back then,
Speaker 8: but there you go. Home is home.
Speaker 1: It is brilliant. I love Sith Street. Hey, you have
Speaker 1: seen Empire strikes back? Obviously, I'm assuming you have.
Speaker 8: Oh, well, yes, I was. Everyone's got their generation that
Speaker 8: they sort of align with, and I think I'm prime
Speaker 8: Star Wars generation. I was twelve for the first one.
Speaker 8: Oh good, and I lived through that thing that well
Speaker 8: Led was mentioning you know what was like when you
Speaker 8: were a kid, and I it wasn't have you seen it?
Speaker 8: It was pretty soon? How many times?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 8: And it was normal six to ten was just to
Speaker 8: be a normal kid. And that's at the cinema. Yeah,
Speaker 8: and there were some kids that were got up in
Speaker 8: the twenties and stuff like that. So of course two
Speaker 8: years later we're fourteen and we've got that freedom. We
Speaker 8: can take the train. They've built Croydon twin cinema. We
Speaker 8: don't have to go to Belgrave. Things like that, and
Speaker 8: yeah it was. It was the big one, the first
Speaker 8: proper expectation, I guess it in our lives. Yeah, and
Speaker 8: it really came through with the goods.
Speaker 2: That's incredible.
Speaker 1: I kind of remember hearing about, like and reading about
Speaker 1: Return of the Jedi, like coming and like. That was
Speaker 1: because I was five when this came out, and I
Speaker 1: wish I could. I kept on going back and forth
Speaker 1: whether I did see it in the cinema or not,
Speaker 1: even though I was only five, or maybe I had
Speaker 1: turned six by the time it came out. I I
Speaker 1: do wonder if I if I saw it, but I
Speaker 1: definitely saw. I have a very clear memory of seeing
Speaker 1: Return of the Jedi, and it's like reading up like
Speaker 1: buying when that's when I started. I think probably the
Speaker 1: reason I started buying movie magazines was to read about, yeah,
Speaker 1: when Return of the Jedi was coming, any gossip about
Speaker 1: anything I could learn about it. This is obviously pre internet.
Speaker 1: The anticipation was so real. I loved it so much.
Speaker 1: That was such a fun chat. Another bit of a
Speaker 1: fun trivia I left out is that Yoda's face, in
Speaker 1: particularly his eyes, was by by Albert Einstein. And as
Speaker 1: soon as I say that Albert Einstein, your head bitch
Speaker 1: of Yoda. For some reason, it makes sense. I don't
Speaker 1: know why, but it does. It works, it works. Who
Speaker 1: knows why? Who knows why? But thank you so much
Speaker 1: while it again for doing watching Empire strikes Back. Email
Speaker 1: us at Yasney podcast at gmail dot com.
Speaker 2: It's been such a long episode this one. We've got
Speaker 2: some great feedback.
Speaker 1: We might say that for another week because we speket
Speaker 1: so long about those Godfather Part two and Malcolm X
Speaker 1: and the cast, so longer than we usually do. But
Speaker 1: it was while he such it like it's an honor
Speaker 1: for me to actually spend time with him because he's
Speaker 1: so thoughtful. He comes at every issue from, you know,
Speaker 1: his own unique perspective. I could have wound those conversations
Speaker 1: up quicker, but I really didn't want to, even though
Speaker 1: I knew we had a whole massive film, maybe the
Speaker 1: one of the greatest solms of all time to discuss.
Speaker 1: I loved his thoughtfulness when discussing those three very different films.
Speaker 2: So it's been an that big episode.
Speaker 1: We'll keep moving and provide some more feedback next week,
Speaker 1: but Yasney Podcast at gmail dot com. Next next week
Speaker 1: on the show, A great mate of mine, one of
Speaker 1: my best mates, Gatesy from Tripod Stephen Gates. I've known
Speaker 1: this man for over twenty years and he's an absolute
Speaker 1: joy and also devours movies, loves them. And we're gonna
Speaker 1: be discussing a more recent film, an Oscar winner Parasite
Speaker 1: from twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2: Bong June Hose. I love this film.
Speaker 1: I've seen it quite a few times and I can't
Speaker 1: wait to watch it again and jump into it with
Speaker 1: Gatesy next week. It won the Oscar in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: he won the Palm Dior at Kahn in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: It is an absolute masterpiece in my mind. Bong June Hose.
Speaker 1: Parasite from South Korea next week, and you ain't see
Speaker 1: nothing yet with Gatesy until then five and our.
Speaker 2: And so we leave all eat safe and salt, and
Speaker 2: to our friends of the radio audience, we've been a
Speaker 2: pleasant good night.